


A Funny Word Called Love

by Ravenclaw37



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Aromantic, Asexual, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Hurt/Comfort, Platonic Relationships, Quasi Platonic Relationships (QPRs)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-29
Updated: 2017-02-09
Packaged: 2018-09-20 14:22:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 13
Words: 41,214
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9495566
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ravenclaw37/pseuds/Ravenclaw37
Summary: A story about Yuri and Otabek's lives together, and how they learn about love from one another. (Disclaimer: I ship Otayuri both romantically and platonically but this is a platonic fanfiction because I don't see many of them)





	1. Chapter 1

Yuri skated to the edge of the rink immediately after hearing his cell phone buzz. He knew that Yakov was tiring quickly of him abandoning his practice whenever he got a text, but he just wanted to talk with his Kazakhstani friend whenever he had a chance, and if he didn’t respond right away, the conversation often ended up going nowhere. It was just a simple text, just small talk, but at that point, that was what most of their conversations consisted of anyways. Just a basic, “Hey, how are you?” But nonetheless, Yuri loved talking to Otabek and hoped that one day they could start to have more in depth conversations. However, though Yuri felt comfortable with Otabek, he still struggled with opening up, and didn’t know how to start. He replied with, “I’m good, just practicing for the Worlds, how are you?” And made to return to the rink. However, when he glanced up, Yuuri was standing right there in front of him. 

When Victor had announced that he would be returning to figure skating, as well as coaching Yuuri, saying that Yuri had been shocked would be quite the understatement. That would be ridiculous, super human even, to coach as well as compete. The toll that it would take on one not only physically, but also mentally and emotionally? He had no clue why somebody would ever attempt to do it. However, that was nothing compared to the shock of finding out that both Victor and Yuuri would be moving to Russia. And not only that, but also that they would both be coached by Yakov, and therefore would be at the same rink as Yuri. 

“Hey, I’ve noticed you’ve been skating over to your phone immediately when it buzzes, anybody in particular that’s texting you?” Yuuri implored.

‘Ugh,’ Yuri thought to himself, ‘this stupid fat pig has been trying to be my friend and be nice to me ever since he got there. Why can’t he just leave me alone!!!!’ A part of him realized as he thought this that it was rude and there was nothing wrong with Yuri trying to be his friend, but annoyance with these types of things, was, at this point, a natural reflex of sorts. 

However, just as Yuri was thinking about how stupid Yuuri was, Mila skated over and scooped Yuri’s phone out of his hands. “Oh! Otabek? Ohh right you two became friends at the Grand Prix Final, right?”

“Yeah,” Yuri muttered, starting to feel awkward and defensive at the addition of Mila to the conversation, the feeling only growing when Viktor skated over.

“I’m surprised honestly, Otabek isn’t really the type to befriends others. Actually, it kinda makes sense, two standoffish people being friends,” Viktor said, shrugging.

“Why are you always intent on replying immediately to Otabek?” Mila asked curiously, with a smirk spreading across her face. 

“I don’t know.” Yuri said, his voice becoming more clipped. He didn’t understand why he was getting this much attention over having a friend. I mean, I guess it must have surprised the others, seeing as he never was the type to seek out companionship in others, but still, they should just shut up about it anyways. Shouldn’t they, at the very least, be happy that he’s trying to interact with others? Mila for one, had always pestered him and told him that he should at least try to make friends.

“Yeah,” said Yuuri, “What is he to you anyways?”

That was it. Yuri was done. He was done with these god damn stupid questions coming from this idiotic pork cutlet bowl. “NONE OF YOUR BUSINESS YOU PIG!!” Yuri screamed, not knowing how else to respond. He didn’t exactly intend to be so harsh sometimes. The words just came out of his mouth before he could stop himself, it was second nature, but it wasn’t like it mattered anyways. People at this point expected Yuri to be that way, so they took no offense to it.  
It was almost time to end practice, and not seeing the point in staying there any longer, Yuri stormed away.

Yuuri’s voice rang in the back of his head, asking once again, “What is he to you anyways?” What were Yuuri and all the others even trying to insinuate. What was going on here. Otabek was a friend. Were the others trying to say that they thought that Otabek was more than a friend to Yuri? I mean, he was, but not in that way. Otabek just meant a lot to him. There weren’t any romantic feelings involved at all, contrary to what the others appeared to be suggesting. He didn’t want to go on a date with him or kiss him or anything, he just wanted to talk into the night with him and be close to him and have deep conversations and be best friends. Was there anything wrong with that?

Once Yuri got to his room a million questions spiraled to his head. Did he love Otabek? No. At least, not in the way that Yuuri loved Viktor and Viktor loved Yuuri. But they all seemed to think that he did for some reason. What even was love to him? What a funny word love was, anyways.   
Yuri’s mind immediately flashed back to the waterfall, and realizing what his Agape was. It was his Grandfather, unconditionally loving him and continuously supporting him in his skating career. But was there any other type of love to him?

He never really had time to dwell on the concept of love. That wasn’t something he had time for. His life was skating, and I suppose you could argue that he loved skating, but outside of skating he didn’t have time. Sure, he kept up his studies, but there wasn’t time for things as trivial and useless as love. There was time for skating practice and more practice to become better and stronger so that he could one day be the best. But love? That seemed like a ridiculous thing to spend time contemplating. 

Yet there he was, contemplating love, all thanks to his rink-mates interrogating him about having a friend. And sure, he wanted to be close to Otabek, but did he love him? Did he have a crush on him? He needed to figure this out. He didn’t think he had a crush on Otabek, and he certainly had never had one before, and therefore he had no real way to tell if he had a crush on Otabek. However, an idea popped into his head. A terrible idea, of course, but he needed to figure this out god damnit. Yuri hated not knowing things. Uncertainty left him uneasy and restless, so he needed to figure this out as soon as possible.   
‘God this is going to be embarrassing’ Yuri thought before pulling out his phone and scrolling through his contacts until finding the one entitled Yuuri, and typing in “How do you know if you have a crush.” Yuri’s fingers lingered over the send button for a few minutes, his mind asking himself repeatedly if he was actually going to do something so obviously stupid. But he wouldn’t be able to rest until he figured this out. It would beat away at him and distract him from practice. If there was one thing that Yuri couldn’t stand, it was the feeling of not knowing. 

He waited a few minutes, going to Neko Atsume and feeding his virtual cats, until his phone buzzed in his hands. Yuuri had replied, saying, “It’s a warm, soft, fuzzy feeling when you’re around that person. I mean it’s kinda hard to describe but I’ll try my best. You might get nervous or flustered easily around that person, you might blush a lot, you might get butterflies in your stomach. You might just really want to date them or kiss them. You might just want to be close to them, though that could also be completely platonic. Wait, what is this about. Is this about Otabek???” 

Yuri read through it once, and read through it again, and then again. Yup, he definitely didn’t have a crush on Otabek. That’s not what it was. I mean he did get nervous, but that was more due to the anxiety that came with having a friend, which was a very foreign concept to Yuri. And he did just want to be close with Otabek, but in a ‘I just want to be friends with you forever and never leave your side.’

Suddenly Yuri got another text from Yuuri, reading “Sorry, Viktor was reading over my shoulder and is about to take my phone. Good luck.”

Oh shit. 

A few minutes later Yuri got a text from Yuuri that he assumed Viktor had written, saying, “Yuri, do you think that you might have a crush on Otabek? Have you had a crush before? Do you know what your sexuality is or are you just questioning it now? How did you not know what it felt like to have a crush Yuri!”  
Yuri took three deep breaths to try and calm himself. Lilia had gotten sick of him ruining all of the fancy trinkets in her house in hiss rages, and therefore had taken it upon herself to teach Yuri some breathing techniques for when he was angry, however, they were often ineffective. “Screw it” Yuri said after his third breath, and started kicking his dresser with all his might. After throwing a few books as well, Yuri felt a lot calmer, and decided that he should at least respond to Viktor’s annoying text.

“Well, I thought I might, seeing how everyone at the rink today seemed to think that I did, but after Yuuri helped clear up the matter on what it felt like to have a crush, I have come to the conclusion that I do not have a crush on him. I do not know what my sexuality is, but I’m also not questioning it, seeing as there’s not actual merit to knowing what it is. And it’s none of your damn business so leave me alone.” Yuri texted, trying to be polite but giving up on it towards the end. He really had had a long day. Somebody ought to congratulate him on making it a full two sentences without swearing, honestly. 

He went back to Neko Atsume. That beautiful game always calmed him down, and those precious, adorable balls of fluff needed to be taken care of. However, it was not long before he got another text allegedly from Yuuri, though more probably from Viktor. Yuri contemplated just ignoring it, as he often did when he was fed up with other people’s shit, but curiosity got the better of him.

The text ended up reading, “Well, sometimes it’s nice to understand other parts of yourself, not just the part of you that skates, so maybe take some time to question your sexuality. It’s kinda nice to understand your identity. However, if you don’t want to, or don’t think it’s important for you to, or just don’t want to put yourself in a box, that’s cool as well! -Yuuri”

‘Good,’ Yuri thought, ‘At least they’re telling me who I’m talking to now!’

Almost immediately after he got another text, “Of course it’s my damn business whether or not you’ve had a crush before. As a fellow competitor, I want you to do well, and you don’t skate your best when there’s something on your mind. You also hate not knowing what’s going on. You flew all the way out to Japan just to see whether I was actually Yuuri’s coach or not, for heaven’s sake. You realize that you could’ve texted me or something, Yakov would’ve given you my number, you know. I know you well enough to know that you hate not knowing something, which is probably why you texted Yuuri in the first place about what it’s like to have a crush. So, as someone who wants to compete with you at your best, not you when you’re distracted, it is my business -Viktor”

Yuri couldn’t believe what was happening. He was never this open with people. It didn’t make any sense to him. Why trust people when they could use what you tell them to stab you in the back later on. Why give somebody a weapon when it’s much safer and more logical to leave them unarmed. Sure, they might use said weapon to protect you, but it was much more likely that they would use the weapon against you, especially when you’re competitors. He had to stop doing this. Yuri then threw his phone against the wall, deciding that it would be pointless to text back, seeing that they would just try to pry him open more. 

His phone buzzed again. ‘Ugh,’ thought Yuri, ‘Already something else to interrogate me about??’

Yuri then preceded to listen to music and just stare into space, letting him think through his anger, causing it to slowly taper off. However, a ringing pierced through the noise of his thoughts. ‘What the hell??’ Yuri thought, ‘Nobody ever calls me! Ugh it’s probably Yakov calling to tell me off for leaving practice early. Ughhhh I should probably answer it or else I’ll get yelled at even more tomorrow.’

He went over and picked up his phone where it had been left, and saw that the call wasn’t actually from Yakov. Oddly enough, it was from Otabek. “Hello?” Yuri answered.

“Oh, hi, I wasn’t, uhm, expecting you to pick up!” Otabek responded, sounding genuinely surprised, although pleased, that Yuri had answered.

“Why not, it’s only 9 here, I’m more surprised that you called me, I mean, it’s midnight over there, right?”

“Yeah, that’s not that late!”

“It’s pretty late for an athlete who’s training for the Worlds!” 

“I mean I guess so, but oh well. And the reason why I called was because you didn’t text back. It was only 7 your time when I texted you, so I figured that you would be done with practice for the day, and wouldn’t have anything else going on. And then you didn’t reply. You just always reply practically immediately, even when it’s at a time when I know that you’re probably practicing! I uhm, I just got worried,” Otabek said calmly, albeit a bit awkwardly.

“Oh! I’m, I’m sorry,” said Yuri, stumbling over the apology. He wasn’t used to apologizing, normally he just glared at someone until they went away, which he guessed caused more problems than it solved. “I’ve just had a really long day, and had thrown my phone against the wall and hadn’t gone to check it when it buzzed, figuring that it was the same people who had caused me to throw my phone at the wall in the first place,” Yuri finished, beginning to relax into the conversation.

“Oh, okay. Are you alright? I mean if you don’t want to talk about it that’s fine. I hope whatever was angering you resolves soon,” Otabek responded, trying not to press too much.

“Eh, it’s fine, my rink-mates were just being assholes today, that’s all,” Yuri said, suddenly putting his guard up once again. Nobody ever asked how he was doing, or even if he wanted to talk about what was upsetting him. They just assumed that they should stay clear of him and let him cool off. Nobody except for his Grandfather actually tried to help talk him through his rage, even if Yuri wasn’t willing to talk through it.

“Okay, I hope everything gets better with them soon, let me know if there’s anything I can do to help!”

The two started having mindless conversations, asking each other about their music preferences, things that they enjoyed to do when off ice, talking about their childhoods, what it was like for Otabek to live in so many different countries, what it was like for Yuri to live with Yakov and Lilia leading up to the Grand Prix Final. The conversation was a haze of chatter, laughing, and smiling, and it was by far the longest Yuri had talked to his friend.

However, out of the corner of his eye Yuri noticed his alarm clock. “Shit,” Yuri told Otabek, “It’s midnight! I’m so sorry I wasn’t watching the time! I’m such a stupid idiot!! That means that it’s 3 in the morning for you I’m so sorry!!! You’ll be so tired tomorrow god damnit! I’m so sorry Otabek!!”

Yuri would’ve continued forever if Otabek hadn’t cut him off, saying, “Yuri, it’s alright! Don’t worry it will be okay!” Otabek’s voice was so soothing, how could he be so calm right now, “Trust me, I don’t need that much sleep to be able to function. Now go to sleep Yuri. Goodnight, I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”

Yuri felt much calmer after Otabek’s reassurances, and replied, “Goodnight Beka,” slipping due to his tired state of mind and calling him the nickname that he had come up with long ago but never saying outloud.

“Beka?” Otabek questioned, chuckling slightly.

“I’m so sorry! It’s just a nickname that I came up with for you! I didn’t mean to call you it, I’m just tired and I’m not thinking properly! I won’t call you it again, I’m sorry!” Yuri said, embarrassed. 

“No it’s fine! Actually I kinda like it.” 

“Oh, okay then, goodnight Beka.”

“Goodnight Yura.”

‘Yura?’ Yuri thought as he hung up and tried to fall asleep, If anybody else had used this affectionate version of his name, they would have been met with at least a stream of violent curse words, if not some objects being hefted in their direction. But Otabek, Otabek was different. Even though Yuri didn’t have any feelings for him romantically, he certainly did have platonic ones, and it almost made sense for Otabek to call him Yura. ‘I’ll figure this all out tomorrow’ was the last thing Yuri thought before drifting off into dreams.

The next day at the rink, however, Yuri was struggling, due to his head was swirling with confusion. Half finished thoughts that he could not find the endings to, questions that would come up just as he was about to attempt to land a jump. Yuri figured that it was probably because he had gone to bed at midnight, and had had to wake up at 5, because a certain coach had decided that early morning runs were the best way to improve one’s health. Yuri didn’t know what was wrong with him. He could always complete the landings, it was Yuuri that struggled with falling down repeatedly. But now Yuri had fallen on his fifth consecutive attempted jump, and could feel the bruises starting to form across his legs already. Viktor was right, he really couldn’t stand not knowing. 

“Hey, is everything okay? Is this about yesterday? I can tell everyone to try and leave you alone about this if you want,” Yuuri said as he skated over to the younger, angrier one.

“Everything’s fine, I’m just tired, leave me alone!!!!” Yuri told him, trying to refrain from yelling, but that proved to be difficult, seeing as his lack of sleep made him even crankier than usual.

“Everything is certainly not fine. You always land your jumps! You’re definitely not okay right now, are you sick?”

“No, I just couldn’t fall asleep and I had to wake up at 5 fucking am so leave me alone!”

Seeing that he wasn’t going to get anywhere, Yuuri skated over to Viktor, expressing his concerns, who went back over to Yuri.

“Great, another person to pester me,” Yuri muttered. He had been so happy last night, but now everyone couldn’t leave him alone and he also couldn’t concentrate and couldn’t skate, so that happiness had left so suddenly that it felt like it had never truly been there in the first place.

“Yuri was there any reason you were up so late?” Viktor inquired.

“Like I told Yuuri, I just couldn’t fall asleep. Now go away,” said Yuri with a tone of finality.

“Okay,” Viktor said, spotting Yakov across the ice and gliding over to him and talking to him rapidly, then Yakov made his way over to Yuri.

“Yuri, go home!” Yakov said harshly.

“What?” Yuri said, quite perplexed by the request.

“You’re tired and can’t land your jumps. Tired athletes injure themselves. Go home and rest, I expect you at practice after lunch. Try to get more sleep, I will be quite disappointed in you if I find out that you stayed up that late on purpose.”

“Okay, I’ll see you in a few hours.” Yuri said before taking off his skates and returning home, grateful that Viktor had talked to Yakov. Now he would have time to get a few more hours of sleep and maybe find a way to quiet the voices in his head.

After a 3 hour nap, it was only 10 am. Plenty of time to think through the hurricane that was rampaging through Yuri’s mind. ‘Damn,’ Yuri thought, ‘Viktor was right. I really can’t stand to not know something. Ugh, I hate it when he’s actually right!’ And before now he didn’t even realize that he didn’t know this. He didn’t have time to realize that he had never really thought about that terrible, confusing, funny word that people called love. It hadn’t been a priority so he wasn’t even aware of his lack of knowledge on the subject.

‘Okay, let’s make a list,’ thought Yuri since lists had always helped him out in the past. They were clear and concise. Not confusing, and not frilly or fancy either. He went to his desk and pulled out a piece of paper and made two columns, one entitled: What I Know, and the other entitled: What I Have No Fucking Clue About.

Under What I Know Yuri wrote:   
That I don’t have a crush on Otabek  
That everybody else things that I do  
That I really like him but it’s platonic   
That somehow I didn’t throw a fit when he called me Yura  
That I want to be close to him, but just be really close friends and never leave his side.

Under What I Have No Fucking Clue About Yuri wrote:  
Why everybody thinks I have a crush on Otabek  
Why I didn’t freak out when he called me Yura  
What my sexuality is (and if it even bears any type of relevance to my life)  
Was there even a word for just really really liking somebody in a platonic way?????

After making these lists he felt a lot calmer. Sure, it hadn’t given him any answers, but he had to admit that the thoughts and questions seemed a lot less overwhelming when it was on paper instead of just swirling thoughts keeping him from doing anything. 

Back at the rink, Yuuri and Viktor were debating what they should do. They both couldn’t help but feel partially responsible for bringing about what seemed to be like an identity crisis. They both knew how unsettling it could be to not quite know who you are, and Yuri either didn’t know that he didn’t quite know who he was, or he didn’t care. Either way, he’s realized that he doesn’t know, and now he does seem to care, and it was so far proving to be terrible for him.

“He hasn’t missed jumps like that ever! Even when he was a little kid in Juniors, after failing a jump he could always do it on his second, or maybe third try, even if it was a bad day!” Viktor exclaimed. 

“I know! I mean for me it was good to know my identity, once I figured it out I felt a lot calmer and self assured. But that must not be the case for Yuri, he seemed perfectly happy to not know. I don’t think he even realized that he didn’t know. And now that he’s realized it? He can’t seem to concentrate on anything! Now he needs to know, and it’s all our fault!” Yuuri said, shaking his head.

“Well, we could at least try to help him? Give him a few links to guide him along his search???” 

“We could at least try, it probably wouldn’t hurt. He might not bother looking at the links but oh well.”

Yuri got a text just as he was about to start eating lunch. It was a link to a website about sexuality and self discovery and shit. It’s not like Yuri needed this, thinking,‘I don’t need to figure it out. I was perfectly content with not knowing so I can be content with not knowing now.’ But even though he was thinking this, he still found himself unlocking his phone, and going to the website.


	2. Chapter 2

This website wasn’t exactly helpful for Yuri. He scrolled through different sexualities and he couldn’t find one that made sense. Homosexual, somebody who was attracted to the same gender, bisexual, attracted to 2 or more genders, pansexual, attracted to all genders, and polysexual, attracted to multiple genders. Those were the 4 things that the website talked about. It also had crap about how self discovery was important, but also about how you shouldn’t try to shove yourself in a box and such. How was he supposed to figure this out if he had never had a god damn crush on anyone and couldn’t see himself ever dating anyone. All of these options for sexualualities required this. It just didn’t make sense.

‘Oh well,’ Yuri thought, realizing that it was almost time to go back to the rink, ‘I can figure this out later. For now I’m going to try and skate my god damn best and show Viktor and Yuuri that I’m fine and don’t need their stupid, useless help!’

When he got there, Yakov walked over to him as he was putting on his skates, “Are you feeling any better?”

“Yes, getting some more sleep really helped me clear my head,” Yuri said, and then noticed Yuuri and Viktor walk past him and Yuri muttered, “No thanks to you idiots,” glaring at them pointedly.

“Guess he didn’t find that website we sent him very helpful. I mean I guess it wasn’t the most in depth list. I mean, it had only 4 sexualities and didn’t even go into the distinguishment between romantic and sexual attraction or anything like that, maybe we can find a better website to send him later,” Yuri heard Yuuri tell Viktor.

Yuri decided that he didn’t need their goddamn help and that he was going to be fine, and he was going to prove it to them by landing all his jumps when practicing. He knew that he could land them if he focused, and as long as his thoughts didn’t start screaming at him, he should be fine.

Yakov, was needless to say surprised when his student who was trainwreck that morning came back after lunch with such a look of resolve and determination, then landed all of the jumps that he tried, which was quite a lot considering that today’s training was completely devoted to perfecting jumps. Well, Yakov supposed he didn’t land them all. He just missed landing his quadruple flip, but with that quad, it’s almost a given that you’re not going to land it. It’s just too hard.

Yuri was surprised as well with how well it was going. Once he had gotten all of his thoughts out, he felt much better. Sure, it sort of bugged him that he didn’t quite know who he was but what did it matter. Oh wait, it didn’t. Yuri had much better things to focus on than identity. Like the fucking Worlds which were closing in around them all.

It was almost time to go and Yuri had one thought on his mind. He was going to land a quadruple flip, just to see Yuuri and Viktor’s reactions. Oh, and maybe record it to send it to Otabek. Nobody would think that he would land it, due to his lack of sleep. Yuuri and Viktor definitely wouldn’t expect it, considering that they seemed to be treating him like a wounded puppy.

‘I’m not a wounded puppy,’ Yuri thought as he prepared to jump, ‘I am a strong, independent cat who doesn’t need your idiotic help!’ He spun through the air, and managed to land it.

He shot a piercing glare at Yuuri and Viktor as he skated over to the edge of the rink, and Viktor said, “Yuri! That was amazing! Did you figure everything out now? Is that why you’re so focused?”

“I figured out that I don’t need your help and that I’m good with not knowing, thank you very much,” Yuri snapped before taking off his skates and returning home and sending Otabek the video of his quadruple flip, along with a text reading, “I’ve got a few more tricks up my sleeves for the Worlds!”

By the time he had gotten home to Lilia’s place, he had received a text back that read, “Wow, after only getting about 5 hours of sleep? I’ve got to step up my game, Yuri” and then a thumb’s up emoji at the end.

 

Time moved quickly for Yuri. There was always something to be done, skating practice to go to, studies to attend to, competitions, you name it, so it always seemed to go by so fast. The next year was a blur for Yuri. By now, Yuri was 17 and Otabek was 20, and his life started to have more of a pattern to it. Competitions came and went, and at each competition he got to see Otabek, which was always nice, for no matter how much they skyped, called, and texted, it was nothing like hanging out with him in person. They never had much time together in person, though. Maybe they would have an evening that they could spend together, but that was not nearly enough.

So, Yuri got to thinking that maybe, just maybe, since it was the off season and there were no competitions right around the corner, that maybe Otabek could come to St Petersburg for a week, and after contemplating it for a while, Yuri decided that he had to at least give it a shot.

Yuri dialed Otabek’s number, his heart thumping as the line ringed. He had never invited somebody to come to his house. As a child, it’s not like he had play dates or anything like that. From a very young age, he was too concentrated on skating to try and make friends. Sure, he was acquaintances with his rink-mates, but he was careful not to get too close to any of them. They were competition, after all. Otabek was the only exception to that rule.

“Hello Yura,” Otabek said when he picked up. It no longer surprised Yuri when he got called his nickname, over the year, the two had called each other their nicknames more and more until it was habit instead of something surprising and odd.

“Hey Beka! So, uhmmmm, I was ehm wondering if, since it’s the offseason, you might like to come to St Petersburg?” Yuri said, rushing through the sentence with anxiety.

“Oh, of course! That sounds lovely. When would you like me to come?” Otabek replied, sounding surprised yet pleased.

“Maybe next week? Unless that’s too early to get a flight. I don’t know, just come when there’s a cheap flight and when you can get out of practice! I can take you to all the sights in St Petersburg and you can meet my cat and I can cook you some pirozhkis!”

“Sounds great, but you’ll have to visit Almaty sometime, okay? I haven’t been back in Kazakhstan for too long, but I could still show you around.”

“Awesome! Let me know when you figure out you can come so I have time to clean up. My rooms kinda a mess, to Lilia’s dismay.”

“I hope that not everything in your room is broken. You should only buy things that are immune to being kicked, and things that won’t break if they have something thrown at them or if they are thrown at something.”

“Haha very funny.”

The conversation once again continued, floating from subject to subject, never pausing for silence to sing. Though these two tended to have very few words for others, or in Yuri’s case, only angry words for others, they both could not stop talking in the presence of one another, for they had both grown very comfortable with each other over the time that they had known one another.

Otabek was in fact, going to come the next week. That Sunday in fact. And Yuri had to get out of practice. Sure, Yakov wasn’t going to be happy about it, but it was the off season, so he wouldn’t be too mad. Thankfully, Lilia hadn’t been too upset upon hearing about having a visitor, instead deciding that it was good that Yuri was socialising with others by choice rather than force.

“Hey, can I have next week off?” Yuri asked.

“Why?” Yakov inquired.

“None of your business.”

“If you want the next week off, then I would advise that you don’t take that tone with me, and that you tell me why you need next week off.”

“Okay, fine. Otabek is coming over for the week so I’d like to have the week off so that I can spend time with him. Is that okay?” Yuri said, looking up at the coach both hopefully and expectantly.

“Ugh, I suppose, but only if you agree to work twice as hard the next week. And yes, that does mean that you have to get up at 5 am every day to run instead of twice a week. Don’t look at me like that, you’re the one getting an entire week off!” Yakov said grumpily, though he was actually quite happy that Yuri was going to be spending time with his friend, something that had never happened before.

“Thank you so much!” Yuri said to Yakov, then, unexpectedly pulling the coach into a hug. Physical contact was an extremely rare thing for Yuri to initiate, and most of the time if you touched Yuri, you could expect to be met with a fist in your face, but Yuri was happy enough with his success in getting the week off that he hugged his coach.

Popping Yuri’s happy bubble, Viktor, who had overheard the entire conversation, said, “Oh Yuri! You’re hanging out with your friend?”

“Yeah, so what.” Yuri snapped, his happy mood disappearing immediately.

“Eh, nothing…” Viktor trailed off, using a voice that seemed to suggest that he thought that Yuri and Otabek were more than just friends, or that Viktor wanted them to be more than just friends.

‘Why can’t that idiot just understand that we’re just friends, and that’s just as meaningful as being in a relationship. Not everybody wants to be like Viktor and Yuuri!’ Yuri’s mind shouted, wanting to actually tell that to Viktor but feeling like that wouldn’t end in his favor, and that it would rather end in another boring lecture from Viktor about how much he loves Yuuri, for if you even mention the Katsudon’s name, Viktor will go on a ridiculously long tangent, and nobody wanted that.

That week went dreadfully slow. He just wanted Sunday to come so that he could see Otabek. Yuri was extremely distracted during practice, and though not doing that poorly, he could tell that Yakov was shaking his head whenever he watched Yuri skate. However, Yakov knew that Yuri was just too distracted to perform well, and that he would be back to his normal determined and competitive mindset after Yuri and Otabek had hung out.

On Friday, as everyone was leaving for the week, Yuuri went up to him and said, “Have fun with Otabek, I hope everything goes well!”

And then Viktor said, “Let me know if anything happens,” while winking.

“Go away idiots!” Yuri shouted. Again Viktor was implying that Yuri and Otabek were going to date or some shit like that. But that wasn’t the case, at least on his part he didn’t like Otabek that way. If Otabek liked him that way, though Yuri didn’t think that that was possible, he didn’t know what he would do or how he could handle that, but that was another problem for another day.

Yuri returned home to clean up all of the mess, in his room, for Lilia kept the rest of the house impecable. Yuri had to admit that he was incredibly excited to be able to spend an entire week with Otabek.

 

Sunday came and Yuri was at the airport, excitedly and nervously waiting for Otabek to arrive. He had been quite busy trying to prepare for Otabek’s arrival, mainly having to clean, and in all honesty, everything he touched ended up being a mess. He just didn’t see the point of cleaning if it was just him that was going to see it, and Lilia at that point had given up on trying to get him to clean. But, he did see the point of cleaning if he was going to have a visitor, it’s just that that hadn’t happened before.

As Otabek boarded his plane in Kazakhstan he was also very excited to see Yuri. He had never gone over to a friend’s house, and hanging out with Yuri sounded like it was going to be a lot of fun. However, Otabek’s heart was also pounding in his chest as the plane took off. This was new territory for him. Yuri was his first real friend. He had always been a very shy and quiet child, which prevented him from making friends easily in the first place, and later in life he started moving from place to place for skating. It’s not that he didn’t want friends or that he considered himself above others or anything like that. It was just that he knew that he was going to leave the place he would eventually have to leave the place he was training at, so why try and be someone’s friend when it wouldn’t last? Why try to do that if you were just going to have to leave? It didn’t compute in his mind. Now, however, Otabek was back at his home rink and didn’t intend on moving again. And he had gone out on a whim, had been impulsive, and had befriended Yuri, and so far, he had no regrets. There wasn’t a single thing he would change. Otabek was so happy to be able to see his friend in person again, but what if he messed it up. He knew how prone to anger Yuri was, and didn’t want to be the reason for one of his fits. So, anxiety filled his head more and more with every second that passed, just hoping that he could somehow manage to make this whole trip go perfectly.

Otabek was soon going through Russian customs, and when he went to pick up his luggage he was met by a short, excited Russian. “Hey Beka!” Yuri said, trying at the last second to keep up his ‘cool’ front and act like he wasn’t that excited.

“Hey Yura!” Otabek responded, and then pulled the tiny blond into a hug. Yuri immediately tugged himself away, looking both shocked and confused. ‘Though we’ve made a lot of progress with our friendship over the last year,’ Otabek thought, ‘I guess no hugs. I forgot that he hated physical contact so much. Ugh he seems so uncomfortable! Maybe we’ll get to that point eventually…’

“I, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to do that…” Yuri apologizes. “I’m just not used to physical contact, it startles me a lot. Things like hugs just confuse me and frighten me sometimes they just don’t really make sense, and I tend to freak out a little bit. I’m sorry.” Once again it felt weird for Yuri to apologize for something, but it felt even weirder when he noticed himself extending his arms and hugging Otabek.

Otabek however was quite relieved when Yuri hugged him. To him, it’s a sign of trust. It’s a sign that he didn’t mess anything up with that silly act. “What’s so confusing about hugs?” Otabek mused as they released each other from the brief hug. “It’s just a way of showing your love for somebody.”

‘Love???’ Yuri thought, ‘There it is. That stupid, confusing, silly word that doesn’t make sense, yet everybody is so concentrated on. What is even going on anymore… I that wish he hadn’t have said that. Ugh but he did, just move on. Ignore it. Keep it cool, you can do this.’  
Otabek notices the look of panic flash across his face, and soon after realizes the problem with what he had just said, ‘Oh. Love. I guess Yuri’s not comfortable with that word either…’

“So,” Yuri said, interrupting Otabek’s thoughts and changing the subject, “What do you want to do first?”

Surprisingly enough, all Otabek had wanted to do when he first arrived was bring his stuff to his hotel, and then just hang out with Yuri. No fancy sightseeing or restaurant. He hadn’t ever gotten the chance to spend a prolonged amount of time with his friend in person, so that’s what he wanted to do.

When Yuri heard this he was a bit surprised, but happy nonetheless. Once they got back to Yuri’s home, Yuri was struck with what he thought was a brilliant idea. “I know! I’ll cook for you!”

“What?” Otabek questioned. “You really don’t have to do that, we can just order pizzas or something!”

“No no no no no! I’ll make you Katsudon Pirozhkis! My Grandpa gave me the recipe after he first made them for me at the Rostelecom Cup! Don’t worry, it’s no trouble at all! Trust me, these are delicious, they’re my favorite food!”

“Okay…”

“Do you not have any faith in my cooking abilities?”

“No no no! Of course not! I’m very curious to try these Katsudon Pirozhkis, they must be really good if you like them so much!”

‘Fuck,’ thought Yuri as he walked into the kitchen, ‘I shouldn’t have hyped them up so much! What if they're bad What if Otabek doesn’t like them! Ugh, why do I do this!’

“Here, could I help you? I feel weird just sitting here while you cook for me, I want to help out,” Otabek kindly inquired

“Are you sure? Can you cook?” Yuri questioned, realizing as soon as the words came out of his mouth that that probably came across as a bit rude.

“Of course I can cook!” Otabek replied indignantly. “Anybody who can read can cook, you know.”

“Okay, I suppose you’re right about that one,” Yuri conceded, realizing that it might be really fun to cook with the help of his friend. “Here’s the recipe. You can start  
getting the pirozhki part ready and I’ll start getting the katsudon, okay?”

“Sounds great!” Otabek replied, searching the cupboards for ingredients, and instead being met by junk food spilling out of a shelf. “Yuri! This is nothing that a competitive skater should have! Does your coach know about this?”

“Of course he doesn’t. But junk food tastes good and as long as I work out, it doesn’t affect my skating in the slightest. And no, Yakov doesn’t know about this, and I intend for it to stay that way. And Lilia doesn’t know about it either, she doesn’t cook very often so she hasn’t found it yet. If she finds it though, I’m dead,” Yuri said, his voice growing menacing towards the end.

“Okay, okay.” Otabek said, returning to the cupboards, this time succeeding in finding the ingredients.

The pirozhkis were soon done, thanks to having two people working on them at once instead of just one. Yuri and Otabek sat down and started to dig in.

“Wow.” Otabek said after his first bite.

“Is everything okay?” Yuri said, looking frantic, apparently clueless that the wow was meant as an exclamation of adoration rather than disgust. “Do they taste bad?”

“No no no, of course not. I just wasn’t expecting them to be so delicious! These are some of the best things I’ve ever had Yura!”

Yuri beamed back at him saying, “Oh I’m so glad that they’re good!!! I was so worried that I would somehow screw them up in my nervousness!”

“Wait you were nervous?” Otabek asked, concern filling up his voice in an instant.

‘Oh shit,’ thought Yuri, ‘I didn’t mean to say that.’ “Ehm yeah…” Yuri said aloud, and then quickly continued with, “It’s just that you’re the first person that I’ve had over to my house so I really wanted it to go well, especially the first evening you were here, and I was convinced that I was going to make some stupid mistake with these pirozhkis, like add sugar instead of salt or some other mindless mistake like that. It’s silly really…”

“Oh okay. I was actually kinda nervous to come here honestly,” Otabek started, not knowing what he was doing. The words just flowed out of his mouth before his brain could stop him. “You’re the first person that I really considered to be a friend. Since I moved around so much, it was hard for me to make friends, and after a while I sort of forgot how…” he finished, his voice trailing off towards the end. What was he doing, being so honest. He had barely admitted this truth to himself, and now he was telling Yuri! But, he did trust Yuri a lot, and it just sort of made sense to tell his friend this.

Yuri was shocked at Otabek for telling him this. For trusting him with this, “Thank you, Beka, for trusting me with that. Please don’t be nervous around me though, you’re doing a wonderful job at being my friend.”

“Th-thank you for trusting me as well, I’ll try not to be nervous around you, as long as you’re not nervous around me. Thank you for being honest. It feels like very few people in this world are honest these days,” Otabek said in reply.

The dinner continued on, conversation flitting amiably, until they were almost done, and Otabek went over to the counter where he had noticed some sparkling cider, and poured to glasses, and said, “I propose a toast.”

Yuri looked up at him in surprise and said, “Yeah?” Yuri had to admit that he was quite curious about what Otabek would toast to.

“A toast to honesty, trust and friendship,” Otabek called out.

“To honesty, trust, and friendship,” Yuri echoed.


	3. Chapter 3

Over the next couple of days Yuri and Otabek went sightseeing together, they ate at amazing restaurants, and they played a lot of video games together. Neither of them ever got bored of the other’s company, both dismayed when it grew late and Otabek had to return to his hotel for the night.

On Wednesday, halfway through Otabek’s stay, they played a dangerous amount of Mario Kart, which they had played together earlier in the week and decided was their favorite. It got to be ridiculously competitive and aggressive, for although Otabek was not typically an aggressive person, Yuri was definitely succeeding in bringing out that side of him when they were playing Mario Kart. Plus, Yuri found it immensely entertaining watching this calm, level headed person be reduced into a swearing mess whenever he lost.

After that Yuri decided that it was high time that he showed Otabek the Grand Palace. 

“Wow…” said Otabek once they reached the stunning site. 

“I know… I think this is my favorite place in St Petersburg, besides the ice rink. I first came here when my Grandfather took me for my fifth birthday. I’ve made a point to come back here fairly regularly ever since. Every time it feels like I notice something different about this place,” Yuri said with a far away look in his eyes.

Otabek noticed that every time Yuri talked about his Grandfather, his eyes twinkled. That man must be really special to Yuri. “It really is amazing,” Otabek agreed, not feeling like his words really captured the truly spectacular sight that was before his eyes.

They roamed around the grounds, grabbed some dinner from a nearby cafe, and were about to head back to Yuri’s home for another intense round of Mario Kart when Yuri turned to him and said, “Follow me.”

“Where are we going?”

“You’ll see once we get there…” 

Otabek was about to protest, for he hated being kept in the dark, but then he noticed how excited Yuri looked, and decided that it would be better just to see where Yuri ended up taking him. He was, after all, a very curious person.

“Everybody should have gone home by now,” Yuri said, “Or at least I hope that everybody’s gone home.”

“What are you talking about?”

“You’ll see, we’re almost there anyways, have patience!”

“Me? Have patience? Look who’s talking…”

“Oh shut up.”

“Wait are we at the ice rink?” Otabek asked as he was being ushered through the doors of a massive building.

“Why yes, we are. We can at least try to keep in shape while on our break.” 

Otabek’s face broke out into a grin, but then faltered when he realized that he didn’t have any skates with him. Yuri, noticing his smile fall, and guessing the reason, said, “Oh don’t worry about not having ice skates, there’s plenty of skates to rent. I mean, they’re not the best quality, but they’ll do for now.”

Otabek found skates in the right size and joined Yuri on the ice. “Ice skates are amazing aren’t they?” Yuri said. 

“I mean of course they are, but why do you say that?”

“They’re like shoes that somebody attached knives to. They’re shoes that double as weapons!”

“I don’t know whether I should laugh at that, or run away from you…”

“Probably both.”

They continued skating for a long time, just roaming around the ice, conversing with one another. It was much different than the usual vigorous skating that they both regularly endured during practice. It was getting pretty late so they were about to head off the ice when Otabek turned to him and said, “Thanks for such a wonderful day, love.” But immediately regretted this statement when he noticed the alarmed expression spread across Yuri’s face as soon as he heard the last word.

‘Love???’ Yuri thought, his mind thinking a million things at once, ‘There’s that stupid, funny, confusing word again. I want to obliterate the word for love from every language! Fuckfuckfuckfuck what do I do!!!! This doesn’t make any sense??? Does Otabek like me in a romantic way??? How do I handle this!?’   
And despite all of the thoughts in his mind, none of said thoughts seemed to hold any answers as to what he should do, or even what he could do, and not seeing a better option, he ran away.

 

Yuri didn’t know what he was doing or what the hell was happening but he knew he needed to get away to somewhere where Otabek wouldn’t find him. He would talk to Otabek eventually, and hopefully try and work this whole thing out, it’s just that right now he needed some time and some space to think, to hopefully come up with some rational solution to this mess that had been caused by one seemingly insignificant word. He racked his head for places to stay other than his home and the only one that he thought that Otabek wouldn’t find him easily at was Yuuri and Viktor’s apartment. This wasn’t going to be pleasant, of course, but to hell with it, desperate times called for desperate measures.

Thankfully, Viktor and Yuuri’s apartment was nearby, and he was soon ringing the doorbell. “Yuri?” Viktor questioned when he opened the door. “What’s going on? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

“None of your damn business, I just need a place to stay until I’ve sorted everything out!” Yuri said, trying to keep himself from taking out his emotions on Viktor by taking a couple of deep breaths.

“Hey it’s okay, you can always stay here if you need. But what do you need to sort out? Is your home okay? Did something go wrong? Is Otabek alright?” Yuuri asked, soothingly.

“Can I please just have some time alone to think things through? Please?” Yuri said in a strained voice, desperate to have some space so that he could process everything. 

“Of course, we’ll leave you alone. Let us know if you need anything,” Viktor said quickly, quite surprised at this sudden action from Yuri. He had never, in all the time they had been rink mates, seen Yuri say please, let alone look so desperate and scared. Something must’ve gone terribly wrong.

‘Thank god,’ Yuri’s mind said as Viktor and Yuuri exited the room. ‘Okay, so what now? What did Otabek mean when he called me ‘love’? Does Otabek have romantic feelings for me? If so, would he be okay with the fact that I don’t? Would this somehow ruin our friendship?’ These thoughts continued to spiral and spiral, Yuri losing control of the dialogue, the opposite of what he had hoped to achieve by thinking through everything. Tears started to fall into his lap, and he didn’t even realize that he was crying. 

“Yuri, I’m going to come in, okay?” Yuri heard Viktor call out to him, and then saw Viktor enter the room before waiting for a response. The older man rushed over to the younger one when he saw the streams of tears cascading down Yuri’s face, quickly running to get his tissue box and returning to say, “Hey, what’s going on? Do you want to talk about it?”

“I just don’t want to lose him,” Yuri whispered, more to himself than to Viktor.

“Hey, I don’t know what’s going on. I mean, I assume that it has something to do with Otabek, but still. No matter what this is right now, it’s going to be okay. Whatever this is will pass. You’re going to be okay,” Viktor reassured, and Yuri began to regain a little bit of his composure.

Suddenly there was a loud knock on the door. Viktor exclaimed, “I’ll get it!” And opened the door to an extremely worried looking Otabek. Viktor didn’t know whether to keep him away from Yuri at all costs or to bring him to Yuri immediately, so instead Viktor just stood frozen at the door.

Yuuri had also walked into the main room, and Yuri mouthed “What the fuck” to him, surprised and annoyed by Otabek’s sudden appearance.

Yuuri walked over to Yuri and explained, “When you came over I assumed that something seriously bad had happened, and had found his contact info on your phone and texted him. Oh don’t look so angry, you left the phone right on the counter and I was concerned for your safety. I just sent him, ‘Yuri showed up at Viktor and I’s apartment looking super shaken. Is everything alright?’ Stop glaring at me, I thought your home had burnt down or something like that. I still don’t even know what’s happening honestly! You know that you can talk to me, right? Sometimes it helps to talk to people instead of just shutting them out.” 

Yuri then decided to be a bit impulsive and walks over to the door. “Hey,” Otabek said, “Do you ehm, want to talk outside?”

“Sure,” Yuri mutters, avoiding eye contact and following Otabek to the outside of the apartment building. Though it was cold, it was far from curious ears that might try to listen in on the conversation, so the chill was worth it. 

While walking out, Otabek’s mind was racing, ‘I did it. I screwed it up. It had to happen, I suppose. An entire week without any disasters would’ve been to good to be true… What the hell am I even going to do??? I guess I just have to try and explain myself…’ 

As soon as they got outside Otabek started rambling, “I’m so so sorry. I feel like I’ve just messed up everything with you. I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to say that. It’s just that I forgot. I forgot how other people view the word love. It’s a funny word really. It means something so uniquely different to every person, but people always assume that everybody has the same definition of it. But the word love in my definition is probably something different than love in your definition. Fuck I’m so sorry. It’s just that the concept of what love is to other people is so foreign to me. I forget how other people view the word.”

“What do you mean?” Yuri inquired, now truly confused. What was this man even going on about. 

“To me, love has always been a platonic term. Other people view it as something that is romantic. But I don’t. I’m asexual and aromantic, so I view the word love in a platonic sense,” Otabek said, then noting the bewildered look on Yuri’s face, clarified, “I’m asexual which means that I’m not sexually attracted to anybody, and I’m aromantic, meaning that I’m not romantically attracted to anybody either. I’m so sorry. I forgot that everybody else on this goddamn planet assumes that the word love only refers to romantic feelings. But no, it can be completely platonic word. I’m so sorry that I made you so uncomfortable Yuri. I don’t love you romantically or anything, but I can’t deny that I love you platonically.”

“Oh,” Yuri said, not knowing how to reply after that, and instead staring off into the stars behind Otabek.

“Are you alright? Do you want me to leave?”

“I’m fine. You can stay,” Yuri said, the far away look still in his eyes. Minutes of silence passed before Yuri broke it by saying, “I like your definition of love…”

“Yeah?” Otabek questions, not quite knowing what was happening. Was everything alright? Was this going to turn out okay? 

“Yeah. I also can’t deny that I love you platonically,” Yuri said, and then thought, ‘Finally, I understand how I feel about Otabek. I understand what love is to me!’ Yuri once again didn’t notice the tears pouring down his face, but this time these were tears of happiness. The happiness of actually knowing what that funny word called love was to him. The sense of understanding was beautiful. 

“Yuri are you alright? You’re crying,” Otabek said, worrying he had done something wrong once again.

“Oh…” said Yuri, realizing that there were tears on his cheeks, “Yeah, I’m alright.” And then Yuri found himself hugging Otabek, and noticing that Otabek was crying as well, though Otabek was crying from relief more than anything else.

When they pulled away, Yuri said, “Shit, I left my phone at the apartment, I’ll be right back, then we can go.”

“Okay, I’ll wait here,” Otabek said.

Yuri raced to Viktor and Yuuri’s apartment, with an irrational fear that one of them had gotten into his phone again. He really ought to change his password. Apparently ‘catsarethebest’ had been too obvious, seeing that Yuuri had managed to get into it earlier. He knocked on the door, and was greeted by Yuuri. 

“Is everything alright?” Yuuri asked.

“Yes, I just need my phone,” Yuri replied. 

“I’m extremely curious as to what happened between you two. Care to entertain me with the tale?” Viktor questioned lazily. 

“No I do not ‘care to entertain you with the tale,’” Yuri snapped. “It’s none of your fucking business, idiot.”

“Your phone is on the counter over there Yuri. Despite Viktor’s protests, I made sure that he didn’t get into your phone. You should really change your password though,” Yuuri said.

“Am I supposed to be grateful that you had the basic decency to not invade my privacy???” Yuri said angrily. 

“Well, you make a good point. And even though you won’t tell us what happened, I’m glad that things appear to have gone alright,” Yuuri replied. 

“Thanks, bye,” Yuri responded before walking out the door. 

Yuri joined Otabek outside, and Yuri had to admit that he was quite disappointed that Otabek would soon have to go to his hotel. The night just felt, kind of incomplete in a way. There wasn’t really any other way to describe it, it just felt like there was something left to be said or something like that.

It was just as Yuri was thinking this when Otabek had an odd question. Thankfully the question had nothing to do with their previous conversation, which Yuri was having trouble believing that it had happened, was completely okay with not talking about. Maybe they would talk about it again someday, but for now, it was too soon to recognize what had just been said. Instead, Otabek asked, “Have you seen the Harry Potter movies?”

“No,” Yuri said sheepishly. 

“What? You’ve seriously never seen them? Please tell me that you’ve at least read the books.” 

“Of course I have. I’ve read them more times than I can count. My Grandpa started reading them to me when I was young and ever since, I’ve been obsessed. I’m just worried that by watching the movies, it’ll ruin how I picture everything in my imagination,” Yuri responded, without thinking, not realizing that this was the first time he had admitted to anybody that he was actually a huge Harry Potter nerd, he even wrote and read fanfiction in his limited amounts of free time. But, thankfully, it didn’t look like Otabek was judging Yuri for this. 

“Okay, I have to right this wrong,” Otabek resolved. 

“Right this wrong? I just admitted to you how much I love the books! If you need more proof, I write and read fanfiction about the series for fuck’s sake. Why do I need to watch the movies as well!” Yuri argued, not realizing that he had just admitted to writing fanfiction until the words had fallen out of his mouth. 

“You write fanfiction? You’ll have to show it to me some time,” Otabek calmly stated, though in his mind he was saying, ‘Seriously? This guy is a huge Harry Potter nerd???’ However, Otabek felt like Yuri might not appreciate that response. “You need to watch them though! They’re so good! Not as good as the books, but still amazing. That’s it. We’re having a Harry Potter marathon.”

Yuri contemplated just saying no, but this was the most excited he had seen his friend get, so he caved and said, “Okay fine, though I have no clue where we’re going to find the movies at this time of night.”

Otabek, on the other hand, knew exactly where to get all 8 Harry Potter movies. While standing in the doorway of Viktor and Yuuri’s apartment, he had noticed that near their tv were all 8 movies. So, he told Yuri, “I’ll be right back.” And dashed upstairs to see if he could borrow them. 

It was extremely nerve wracking asking for the disks, seeing as the only person he was actually comfortable talking to, besides his family and his coach, was Yuri, but he left the apartment, happy to have gotten all 8 disks, and made his way back down to Yuri.

“Okay, here we go! Let’s do this!” Otabek said as Yuri and him started to head back to Yuri’s home. 

Yuri was mildly surprised that Otabek had managed to get all of the disks, but he was at the same time quite curious. Sure, he had valid reasons for not wanting to watch the movies, but he had always wondered what they would be like, and now he finally had the chance to see! “Are we seriously doing this? It’s 10 pm Beka, how are we going to stay awake?”

“If I remember correctly, somebody has a very well stocked supply of sugary junk food that would do the job of keeping us awake. And, since it’s so late, Lilia probably won’t notice and make us stop.”

Yuri couldn’t help but smile, and said, “Okay I suppose.Though she probably wouldn’t have stopped us anyways. Since it’s a break week for both of us, I don’t think she really cares about what we do. She hasn’t stopped us from doing anything so far. These movies better be worth it, though.” 

An hour later they were settled in front of the tv, popcorn in between them, and halfway through the first movie. Yuri hadn’t said a word, being transfixed with the beauty that was before his eyes when a realization struck him. “Otabek, where’s Peeves?”

“Huh?”

“Peeves. He should have shown up multiple times by now. Where is he!”

“I don’t know, Peeves, for whatever reason, was left out of the movies.”

“How could they do that! Peeves is the best!!!!” Yuri shouted, becoming annoyed with the movie adaptation of the perfect book. 

“I mean, he wasn’t exactly crucial to the story, was he?” Otabek stated, trying to use rational thinking to get his angry friend to calm down. However, Yuri was of the opinion that leaving out Peeves was the irrational thing that was happening here.

“Peeves was amazing! And he could have provided good comic relief, and when we get to the fifth book, Peeves won’t salute Fred and George! That was one of the best parts of the entire series!” 

“Hey, it’s alright.”

“No, it’s not alright,” Yuri grumbled. 

“Was Peeves your favorite character or something?” Otabek inquired, perplexed by Yuri’s actions. 

“Maybe,” Yuri responded shyly. 

“Okay, I’m sorry that Peeves isn’t in the movies. But it’s just one small thing, try to enjoy the rest of the movie, alright?”

“Okay fine.”

By the time they were finished, they were both exhausted, and Yuri’s junk food supply was greatly depleted. But Yuri had to admit that watching the movies hadn’t ruined how he had imagined it happening. “Thanks, that was fun!” Yuri sleepily told Otabek.

“Yeah it was,” Otabek responded before they both collapsed from fatigue.


	4. Chapter 4

The rest of Otabek’s time with Yuri in St. Petersburg was quite enjoyable, and it was not long before he had to return back to Kazakhstan. After his time in St. Petersburg, though, he and Yuri either called or skyped every day, instead of once a week with texting dispersed in between. Even if they couldn’t see each other in person, they could still keep in touch.

Over time they grew closer and closer, becoming more comfortable with each other and truly trusting and relying on one another to the extent where it felt like they could ask each other and tell each other just about anything. By then, Yuri was 20 and Otabek was 23, and Yuri decided that Otabek was truly putting that statement to the test when he received a text from him that read, “Hey, odd question, but what does it feel like to have a crush?”

This came completely out of the blue, and Yuri’s first reaction was to just say, “What the hell.” If it had been any other person besides Otabek, he would’ve said, “What the hell.” But instead Yuri ended up simply texting back, “Idk. Why?”

“Oh, it’s nothing, kinda silly, just forget about it. Why did you say idk?” Otabek replied.

“First you explain why. I’m sure that it’s not silly.”

“It really is. It’s just that it’s kinda weird to be ace and aro sometimes, when the whole world focuses on romantic and sexual love, and values them more than anything, and often fails to recognize that there are so many other types of love that are just as valuable. It just makes me wonder if there’s something wrong with me or if I’m missing out or if it would be nice to love somebody the way everybody else in the world wants me to love somebody. I’m sorry, I know it doesn’t really make sense.” 

“Okay, thank you for being so honest, “ Yuri replied. They always thanked the other when they said something that was really honest, or otherwise seemed hard to say. It was like there was a mutual understanding of how hard the concept of trust was for both of them. “I’m sorry. The world fucking sucks. All types of love are equally valuable and anybody who says otherwise is truly an idiot.”

“Thank you, but now it’s your turn. Why did you say idk.”

“Because it’s true. Because I don’t know. You asked what it was like to have a crush on someone. As someone who’s never had a crush on anybody, I simply don’t know what it’s like to have a crush on someone. I’m sorry that I couldn’t have been of more help though. But yeah, I’ve never had romantic or sexual attraction or anything like that so I’m no help when it comes to the area of crushes. Go ask Yuuri or Viktor or someone like that if you want help in that area.” Yuri texted, and then he received two images of two different flags, one striped black, gray, white and purple, and the other striped dark green, light green, white, gray, and black. Utterly perplexed, Yuri then texted, “?”

“Have you ever given any thought to your sexuality?”

“No, I don’t have time for that. I tried figuring it out a couple of years ago but couldn’t find a term that made sense because every single term required having had felt attraction to somebody in a nonplatonic way, and that had never happened and it frustrated me too much so I just gave up on it.”

“Oh, right. I forget how much people like to erase identities. Remember when I was trying to explain to you that I meant love in a platonic way and that I was asexual and aromantic? Sounds like you might be too, but idk, I can’t know how you feel. I mean it’s identity, if you don’t want to label how you feel, cool, if you think that you’re something else, cool. Just what you were saying sounds a lot like you’re ace and aro. And I know that you hate not knowing things, so I hope that this helped.”

It took Yuri awhile to respond as he looked up the terms and figured out that they matched him perfectly. “Thanks Beka. You’re right on both accounts. I’m ace and  
aro as hell, and I hate not knowing things. Thank you!”

“You’re welcome Yura.”

The conversation having died off, Yuri returned to the internet, and discovered something called an ace ring. A black ring worn on the middle finger of your right hand as a symbol of asexuality. Yuri made a mental note to buy one as soon as possible, secretly thinking that wearing one would look badass as fuck. 

The next time Yuri and Otabek skyped, Yuri had a black ring on the middle finger of his right hand, and Otabek told him, “Hey, that ring is pretty ace.” And Yuri couldn’t help but laugh at the terrible pun.

 

Soon after this occurrence, Yuri decided that he was done with everybody’s shit, specifically Yuuri and Viktor’s. I mean, of course Yuri was happy for them. They were perfect for eachother and he was glad that they were finally getting married, but could they just stop? He couldn’t be in either of their presences without hearing about the wedding. Neither of them could shut up for a single second about it, and it was starting to get on Yuri’s nerves just a little. Okay, get on his nerves a lot.

He was also a bit surprised that Viktor had asked him to be his best man. He wasn’t angry about that. Actually, he actually felt a bit honored that Viktor had chosen him, though he wasn’t about to say that outloud. But this meant that even without Yuuri and Viktor around, he had to worry about the wedding constantly, because despite everything else, Yuri truly wanted Viktor and Yuuri’s wedding day to be perfect.

The main thing that was irritating Yuri was that he couldn’t escape the romance. Couldn’t escape the feeling like everybody expected everybody to be married. Despite having reassured Otabek that all forms of love were equally valuable, times like this sure made it feel like they weren’t. Rationally, Yuri knew that platonic love was just as valuable, but the world right now seemed to be screaming at him that it wasn’t, and that he was just some weirdo who couldn’t live up to the world’s expectations for him. He wanted to escape the wedding for just a moment, but it was only a week away, so Yuri knew that that wasn’t a possibility. Nobody ever told him how much work being a best man would be. 

So needless to say, when Yuuri jokingly skated up to Yuri during practice and said, “So. when’s your wedding going to be?” a few days before Yuuri and Viktor’s wedding, Yuri simply broke. He ran away as fast as he could. As much as he had mastered not showing any emotions except for anger, this week had been chipping away at his mental state, and this was the tipping point that caused him to shatter. He found an empty room, and sat up against the wall, and let his emotions fall out of him in the form of tears. 

“Hey, are you alright? I was only joking,” Yuuri said once he had found the younger boy.

“I’m fine. Now leave me alone you idiot.” Yuri snapped.

“I’m sorry.”

“Why?”

“Well, something I said clearly upset you, so I’m sorry. But could you please explain what I said that made you so upset so I don’t do it again?”

Yuri hesitated, but surprised himself by saying, “Fine. I’m upset because I don’t want to get married. I’m upset because I’m ace and aro and it always feels like society wants me to date somebody, wants me to get married, wants me to be exactly like you and Viktor when I’m not. Normally I can just avoid societal norms and just try and say ‘fuck you’ to the world whenever it tries to make me feel like I have to do what it seems to want me to do, but being constantly surrounded by romance and constant talk of the wedding means that I can’t simply ignore it. It just feels like there’s something wrong with me. Like it’s bad that I only feel love in a platonic manner.” Yuri said, then realized who he was saying this to, “Fuck. I shouldn’t of told you that, fucking hell!” 

“It’s okay Yuri. I’m sorry. But platonic love is just as important and valuable and amazing as any other type of love. Society is idiotic. You don’t have to get married like Viktor and I,” Yuuri said, his eyes shining when he mentioned his upcoming marriage. “Love is a funny thing. Love means something different to everybody. If love to you is something platonic, that’s amazing. Love is something beautiful and indescribable and it’s stupid for other people to try and dictate how you experience love.”

“Thanks,” Yuri muttered. 

“What was that?” 

“I said thank you,” Yuri said, more clearly this time, and walked back out to finish practice, leaving Yuuri quite shocked. Yuri thanking somebody was a rare occasion. 

 

The wedding was ridiculously beautiful. It was held in Barcelona, in the church where they had gotten engaged in front of. Though it felt like there were a million people there to Yuri, it was a relatively small wedding, only Yuuri and Viktor’s family and close friends, which appeared to include almost everybody who was in competitive figure skating around the same time as them.

The part of the wedding that Yuri was dreading most was the speech that he inevitably would have to give, due to him being Viktor’s best man. For a while he agonized over what to say, not knowing how to convey that he wished them the best and thought that they were perfect for eachother without sounding like an idiotic sap. 

But, by the time that he had to give the speech, he was prepared. Nervous, but prepared nonetheless, and he started, “A few years ago Viktor met Yuuri at a banquet after the Grand Prix Final. That night, both of them were complete and utter idiots.” 

Yuri’s voice was slightly shaky. Though skating in front of others didn’t make him nervous, talking in front of others certainly did. But he continued by saying, “Yuuri was an idiot because he drank too much and became a complete trainwreck. Viktor was an idiot because that was when he began to fall in love with the other idiot. Once we were back to training in St Petersburg, he was always skating distractedly, if he was skating at all. He was often on his phone, trying to figure out who the Japanese man who had piqued his interest was, and where he could find him. He was so fucking annoying. He would not shut up for one second about how amazing this person was. I honestly couldn’t understand why, seeing how much Yuuri had messed up in the Final that year. I didn’t think that it could get any worse. But then a video was uploaded. A video of Yuuri skating to one of Viktor’s old programs. The few days before Viktor took off for Japan, he would not cease talking about the video. He was either talking about Yuuri or rewatching the video. The day before Viktor left, Yakov had decided to take Viktor’s phone in an effort to try and force him to focus. Though Viktor has never confessed to this, I still think that he stole it back from Yakov without Yakov’s knowledge.” 

Yuri was starting to get the hang of this, continuing with, “By some miracle, Yuuri didn’t find Viktor showing up at his house out of the blue and proclaiming that he was Yuuri’s coach incredibly weird. Before any of us had any time to register what was going on, Viktor was not only Yuuri’s coach, but also Yuuri’s boyfriend. But at the same time, it didn’t actually surprise any of us back in St. Petersburg that much. We knew that if Viktor set his mind to something, he would probably succeed, and I guess that also applied to his relationships. Both of these people are complete idiots, but I’m glad that neither of them has yet been idiotic enough to leave the other. Though they are both annoying as fuck, and are even more annoying when they are around each other because they don’t seem to understand the concept of limiting their pda, but no one can deny that they are perfect for eachother. Love is a different thing to every person. Everybody has a different definition of love that is unique to them. But the love that Viktor and Yuuri share for eachother is beautiful, albeit sometimes sickening, and I hope that they have a long and happy marriage.”  
Yuuri ended his speech and sat back down, trying to ignore the fact that Viktor had tears in his eyes as he said, “Thank you so much Yuri, that was beautiful.” And gave a sigh of relief. He had done it, and it must have been at least semi decent if it made Viktor cry. I mean, he couldn’t help but throw in a few snarky remarks, but overall he was quite civil. Now he could just relax and enjoy the evening. 

The rest of the wedding went by smoothly. Phichit was Yuuri’s best man, and his speech was corny as fuck, but suits him, and it brang both himself and Yuuri to tears. Yuri is slightly amused to find out that instead of champagne or any other alcoholic beverage being served, it’s apple juice, because Yuuri refused to have any form of alcohol at the wedding, for obvious reasons. The first dance of the night is just Yuuri and Viktor dancing to Stay Close To Me, except it was arranged for dancing rather than skating. After that there are some pop songs, with a couple of slow songs, as well as every song that Yuuri and Viktor have ever skated to in competition. 

 

He, like most others, had decided to spend a couple of days in Barcelona after the wedding to get a chance to see the beautiful sights of the city. Yuri was glad to have this opportunity, for the last time he was here he was too anxious about his senior debut to properly enjoy the limited amounts of the city that he did get the opportunity to see. The next day, Yuri ate breakfast with Otabek, who was also at the wedding, at the hotel, and once they had finished, Otabek said, “Follow me.”

“Why,” Yuri replied, immediately warry. 

“It’s a surprise.”

“Okay fine.”

“Oh, and since it’s going to be a surprise, you have to wear this,” Otabek said, whipping out a blindfold. 

“No. I’m not doing this, I’m out,” Yuri protested but Otabek was already covering Yuri’s eyes with the piece of fabric.

“You already agreed,’ Otabek pointed out and lead him out of the hotel, and onto his motorcycle. 

Once Yuri heard the engine hum to a start he crankily muttered, “You better tell me where the fuck you’re taking me.”

“But it’s a surprise.”

“I hate surprises.’

“Well you’ll like this one,” Otabek said, and Yuri protested no more. For one, it was too loud to properly say anything and hope to be heard without shouting, and as well as that, Yuri figured that he didn’t have any chance at winning the argument, so he gave up, figuring that there wasn’t any point of trying anymore.  
Just as Yuri began to get used to the feeling of movement without being able to see where he was going, the motorcycle halted to a stop. Yuri felt himself lead off of the bike, and Otabek said, “You can take the blindfold off now.” 

It was incredibly bright when Yuri first took the blindfold off, but as his eyes adjusted to the returned light, he realized just exactly where it was that they were. He honestly should have predicted it sooner. “Wow…” Yuri said so softly it was almost a whisper, “This is where we first became friends, right?”

“Yeah,” Otabek replied just as quietly. 

They just stood there, looking out at the city, admiring the way the early morning sunlight glistened against anything that was metal. The wind blew through their hair and there was a relaxing atmosphere surrounding them, and yet, Yuri felt like there were words that needed to be said to fill in the silence, but he couldn’t quite figure out what would be the best way to describe what he felt at that moment. 

“Hey Beka, I love you,” he heard himself say. Apparently, his mouth knew what to say even if his brain didn’t, going ahead and saying that funny word without his brain’s consent. 

Otabek looked at Yuri in confusion and it took Yuri about a second to realize what had fallen out of his mouth. Yuri didn’t quite understand why Otabek looked so confused. Otabek had called Yuri ‘love’ after all. Was calling somebody love different than saying ‘I love you’ somehow? 

“I’m so sorry. It’s just true…” Yuri tried to explain. He couldn’t believe that he was saying this, but continued anyways, looking determinedly at the city below instead of chancing looking at Otabek. “I do love you. It’s maybe not in the same way that everybody else seems to view love as. You still look confused so here’s what my definition of love is: Love is caring about somebody no matter what. Love is texting somebody way later than either of you should be up because you don’t want to stop talking to them. Love is trusting the other and opening up to them, no matter how foreign that concept is. Love is supporting each other and guiding each other. Love is being yourself in front of somebody, without putting layers upon layers of masks to hide who you really are. Love is wanting to spend the rest of your life with someone because they are so damn important to you. Love is being flexible even when you’re the most stubborn person in the world. Love is trusting somebody enough to be honest with them and not worrying that they’ll later use it to stab you in the back. Love is admitting your flaws and working to fix them. Love is realizing that neither of you are perfect and that that just makes everything better. Love is caring about someone so deeply that the only word you can use to describe it is ‘love’’ Yuri finished, still not believing that any of that actually came out his mouth. 

“I’m sorry that I looked so shocked and confused. With all of this wedding stuff, I forgot that love could be completely platonic instead of romantic. I’m so sorry. But I love you too, Yura.” Otabek said, his eyes focused on the horizon, then, feeling like there was something more to say, he added, “Love is knowing that no matter how hard you could try, you would never be able to forget someone. Love is feeling yourself open up to someone for the first time in your life and you can’t explain to yourself why you’re doing it, you just are. Love is seeing somebody in danger, maybe in danger of being attacked by fans, but that’s irrelevant, and trying to help them without a second thought. Love is words falling out of you mouth without them going through your brain first, and knowing that even if you do mildly regret saying it, it’s the full truth. Love is being honest with another person and expecting the other to do the same. Love is trying something that you haven’t tried before, like making a friend, and deciding to stay with your decision and see where it takes you without running away. Love is letting somebody know your insecurities and weaknesses and trusting them to not use it against you. Love is being kind to someone and never expecting anything in return. Love is being there for somebody and knowing that no matter what you do, you never want to leave their side.”

Neither of them realized that they were both crying, tears cascading down each of theirs’s cheeks until they turned and faced each other a few minutes later, “Yuri, are you alright? You’re crying!” Otabek said, deeply concerned. 

“I was just about to ask you the same question,” Yuri said, then touched his face and felt the tears, “Oh, fuck, I guess I am. But are you okay?”

“Yeah I’m fine, I guess I am crying, I hadn’t noticed. What you said was just, really beautiful Yura.”

“What you said was absolutely stunning as well Beka,” Yuri said before pulling Otabek into a hug and softly saying, “I love you so damn much.”

“I love you too.”

Yuri suddenly pulled himself out of the hug. “What’s wrong?” Otabek asked, suddenly fearful that he had said something or done something that was wrong. Yuri then went over to the nearest wall and started banging his head against it. “Yuri, is something wrong? Did I say something?”

Yuri shaked his head and said, “No, it’s just that though everything I said was true, that was the stupidest, sappiest thing I’ve said in my entire fucking life!”  
Otabek chuckled before pulling Yuri away from the wall so that Yuri couldn’t hurt himself any more. “You know, sappy isn’t necessarily a bad thing…” Otabek remarked. 

“Seriously,” Yuri said sarcastically and then sighed, though it was not a sigh of discontent, but rather, a sigh of true happiness


	5. Chapter 5

The rest of the time that Yuri was in Barcelona was quite blissful. It was mainly spent with Otabek, and occasionally a few other skaters who decided to tag along with them on their sight seeing adventures. However, as Yuri soon became painfully aware of, happiness could never last for very long, especially in his life. Yuri had just forgotten this time around, gotten swept up in the happiness so much that he forgot that the sadness inevitably came crashing down on you, no matter how happy you might’ve been previously. 

But this, this wasn’t expected. Maybe it should’ve been expected, his grandfather was getting to be quite old. However, the news that Yuri found out a little before he would compete in the Cup of China left him completely shocked. “What!” he yelled into the phone when he heard the news.

“Yes, you were on your grandfather’s emergency contact list,” the nurse who had called him said calmly, “Your grandfather had a stroke yesterday. Thankfully, one of his friends was with him so he got to the hospital quickly enough. It’s still unclear whether he’ll make it or not, but he’s currently in stable condition.” 

“What hospital is he at?” Yuri asked quietly, too shocked to say anything else, and the nurse responds that he’s in a hospital that was in Moscow.

After that, Yuri hung up and collapsed onto the floor. He couldn’t believe what was happening. He couldn’t fucking believe it. He should be able to believe it. His grandfather was 79 after all, old enough that him having a stroke shouldn’t be very surprising. And yet it was. Yuri had never bothered himself with thinking about the future that much. He hadn’t the faintest idea of what he would do after retiring from skating or anything that would make sense to think about in regards to the future. But there were things that he assumed would always be a constant in his life. His grandfather’s presence was one of them. 

“Actually, you know what, this isn’t happening,” Yuri said to himself. “No, it’s not. I’m going to get on the next flight over to Moscow and I’m going to see Grandfather and he’s going to be fine. That bloody nurse just doesn’t know what the fuck he’s talking about.”

Next he picked up his phone and called Yakov. “What!” Yakov screamed when Yuri told him that he was going to go to Moscow. “No! There’s only a week until the Cup of China! You need this time to train, not to fly across the country!”

“I just need to go there and check if my grandfather is okay. As soon as I know that he is, I’ll come back. I can guarantee that I won’t be there for the entire week, and if I’m gone for more than a day, I’ll make sure to find an ice skating rink in Moscow to practice in if I have time. Please, Yakov. I need to check up on him. If he passes while I’m away…” Yuri said, his voice trailing off at the end. No, he wasn’t going to think about that possibility.

“Okay,” Yakov said, heaving a sigh as he gave in, “But if you’re not back in time for the Cup of China…’’ 

“I know, I know, don’t worry, I will be. Thank you Yakov. Oh, and please tell Lilia for me, she’s not home right now and I’m leaving in an hour so I won’t have time to tell her myself, and I don’t want her to worry!”

“You’re welcome Yuri, and I will,” Yakov responded, taken aback by Yuri’s politeness. Actually, he was taken aback by a lot of things. This was the first time that he had seen his student plead for something. Normally, Yuri was much harsher and opted to demand what he wanted rather than resorting to pleading. Yakov was quite perplexed about the matter when it hit him. ‘Oh, right. Yuri’s grandpa raised him. No wonder he’s so worried.’

Worried was an understatement as Yuri frantically packed a suitcase and rushed to the airport, hoping that he wouldn’t somehow miss his flight.

While on the plane, Yuri got several pointed glares due to the incessant tapping of his foot. But whenever somebody glared at him he retaliated with shooting them a glare so fierce that they knew that it would be a very poor decision to so much as glance his way again. Besides, he couldn’t stop tapping his foot. Worry and anxiety was coursing through his veins, his brain coming up with thousands of worst case scenarios with every passing minute. He didn’t know how to rationalize his thoughts. He didn’t know if doing that would even help the situation. What if doing so just gave him false hope, and then something terrible did happen. It would be even harder to bear. So, Yuri tapped his feet as a way to release his nervous energy, even if it did bother his fellow passengers. If he was anywhere else he would’ve practiced the movements of his short program or maybe his free program. But no, he had to be stuck on a cramped, useless airplane with no space to dance away his emotions. So he tapped his feet and let the millions of scenarios clutter his mind.

Soon, however, Yuri had arrived in Moscow. It had been a long time since he had been in this city, since his grandfather normally went to visit him in St Petersburg instead of Yuri visiting his grandfather in Moscow. ‘But now is not the time for nostalgia,’ Yuri thought before calling a taxi to take him to the hospital address the nurse had given him.

Once Yuri was in the taxi, he couldn’t help but wish that the driver would go a little bit faster. He had told her that he needed to go to the hospital. And yet here she was, taking her time, going 5 miles below the speed limit as if Yuri needed to go to the hospital just for a leisurely visit, not like it was urgent or anything. 

Thankfully the hospital was relatively close to the airport and just as Yuri was about to start yelling at her to go faster, they arrived at the hospital. As soon as Yuri got out of the car he raced into the hospital, found out where his grandfather’s room was, and went there as quickly as humanly possible. When he opened the door he saw his grandfather lying on the hospital bed, unconscious, or maybe worse. 

Seeing that his grandfather was still breathing, he went over to the nurse and said, “Can you tell me what’s going on with my grandfather over there?”  
“I’m sorry, I’m not his nurse, I don’t really have a clue,” the nurse responded.

“Then get me somebody who can tell me what’s going on!” Yuri said loudly, though restraining from shouting. It was getting quite difficult to keep his temper under control. Everybody seemed unaware of how urgently he needed to know how his grandfather was doing. He felt like every atom in his body would explode if he didn’t find out soon. He didn’t understand what was going on, and it scared him more than he cared to admit. 

The nurse looked quite taken aback by the angry young man who stood in front ot him, but excused herself to go get a doctor nonetheless. 

“Hello, you must be Nicolai's grandson,” the doctor said, extending her arm to shake hands with Yuri. 

“Yes, I am,” Yuri said exasperatedly, “But could you just tell me what the fuck is going on here. Is my grandfather going to be okay?”

“I know that you’re upset right now, but there’s really no need to swear, young man,” the doctor said sternly, obviously not impressed with Yuri’s rude demeanor. 

“Just. Tell. Me. Whether. My. Grandfather. Will. Be. Okay. Or. Not,” Yuri said, speaking every word slowly and menacingly, glaring at the doctor. He did not have time for people who lectured him on manners instead of telling him important things, like whether or not his grandfather was going to survive! 

The doctor sighed, figuring that this wasn’t a battle worth fighting, and that this boy was probably just upset which was causing him to be so rude, and that he deserved to know how his grandfather was doing despite his lack of politeness. “Yes, he’ll be fine. He probably won’t be able to be as active as he might’ve been before the stroke. He’ll most likely have to use a cane to walk. But he’ll survive.”

“Can I wake him up?” Yuri asked, relief washing over him at the news that his grandfather would be okay. 

“No, he’s not asleep. He’s unconscious right now, but he’ll probably be conscious again by tomorrow,” the doctor responded.

“Okay, thank you, I’ll stop by tomorrow, have somebody call me if he wakes up before then please,” Yuri said, finding it easier to be polite now that he knew what was going on, before he walked out of the hospital to find a hotel and an ice skating rink, hopefully close by to each other.

After Yuri found a hotel and checked in, he went to the nearby ice rink. Primarily because he needed to practice for the Cup of China, but also because he needed to distract himself. He couldn’t allow himself to think about what had just happened. He couldn’t allow himself to dwell on how close his grandfather had come to death.   
He couldn’t allow himself to think of how worried he had been. He couldn’t allow himself to think of what he would’ve done if his grandfather had passed away. So, he had to skate. Skating was the best form of distraction for Yuri. He couldn’t allow himself to think of anything distracting because he used all his concentration for his jumps and keeping in time with the music. Occasionally his thoughts would take over and he would flub his jumps, but that happened relatively infrequently, and if his mind did started to wander, it wouldn’t last long because almost immediately, he would fall, shaking him from his thoughts.

Thankfully, since it was well into the evening, the skating rink was empty, but it would still be open for a few more hours. He started skating laps, throwing in jumps whenever he felt like it. He didn’t want to attempt his routines right now, but rather, he just wanted to let himself be calmed by the familiarity of being on the ice. Let the familiarity of it wash over him and let it melt the stress of the day away. Yuri fell while attempting more jumps than usual, though, because no matter how hard he tried, his mind kept on flitting back to the hospital. To his grandfather lying on the bed, so close to being lifeless. Each time he pictured it his heart rate increased and he fell. 

He continued this pattern until a worker came to yell at him and tell him that they were closing up and that he better get out. However he left feeling significantly comforted. Skating was like a home to him. Something that would always be there to comfort him, to guide him back to safety. Even though Yuri’s body ached all over from where there would sure to be bruises tomorrow from falling so much, he was glad that he had skated. He felt like he at least had an ounce of control over what happened in his life, even if he hadn’t been able to control what happened to his grandfather.

‘Everything is going to be okay. Grandpa’s okay. He’s going to be fine. You can talk to him tomorrow. You’ll be back in time for the Cup of China. Everything’s going to be okay,’ Yuri reassured himself. 

When Yuri got back to his hotel room he finally checked his phone, a device that he normally spent far too much time on, but since his call with Yakov, hadn’t so much as glanced at. There had just been too much going on. When Yuri turned his phone on he saw that he had four missed calls from Otabek. ‘Fuck, is he alright?’ Yuri asked himself before starting to call Otabek himself. 

Otabek picked up almost instantaneously, saying, “Yura!” in a voice that sounded utterly relieved.

“Why did you call me so many times? Is everything okay?” Yuri asked.

“Yeah, everything’s fine. I called so many times because I was worried about you. I called initially just to say hi but then you didn’t pick up, which is a rarity for you. So I tried a little bit later and you didn’t pick up so I was starting to be genuinely worried, so I called twice more, and then you didn’t pick up either of those times and I decided to wait and see if you would call me back and, thankfully, you did,” Otabek admitted. 

“Oh I’m so sorry Beka! I just haven’t had time to check my phone!”

“Why not? You’re normally glued to it, what’s going on that made you get off of your phone?”

“My… my grandfather had a stroke… I flew to Moscow as soon as I could to see how he was doing, so I didn’t have time to check my phone then. And after that I was visiting him, or more so interrogating the doctor as to why Grandfather was unconscious. Apparently he’s going to be fine, except he will have to use a cane, and he should be awake tomorrow. After that I went to the nearest ice skating rink to try and calm my nerves down. I’ve just been so worried. I can’t imagine my life without   
Grandfather. I don’t know what I would do if he passed away…” Yuri said quietly. 

It took Otabek a few moments to respond, slowly processing what was happening and how hard all of it must be for Yuri. Otabek still didn’t know that much about Yuri’s childhood, since that was a subject that Yuri avoided like the plague, even with Otabek, but from Otabek’s understanding, Yuri’s grandfather had been the one to raise Yuri rather than either of Yuri’s parents. “I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry Yura. Is there anything I can do to help? Are you okay? Do you want to talk about it?”

“It’s okay, and not right now I don’t think. I’m going to be fine. I’m a bit shaken right now but I’ll be fine. And currently I’m just mentally and physically exhausted but it might be good to talk about it tomorrow when I’ve calmed down a little bit. Is that okay?”

“Of course. Goodnight Yura.” 

“Goodnight Beka,” Yuri said before drifting off into a deep, and thankfully dreamless sleep.

As soon as Yuri woke up, he rushed off to the hospital. He didn’t bother eating breakfast and barely thought to throw on some of the clean clothes that he had packed before quickly walking the mile or so that it was to the hospital, passing the ice skating rink he had visited the previous night along the way. 

When he got there, he was pleased to see that his grandfather was upright. Looking downright exhausted, but upright. “Oh, hello Yuratchka, what are you doing here?” Nicolai asked, surprised to see his grandson here.

Yuri ran up to his grandfather and hugged him tightly until his grandfather seemed to be gasping for air. “Sorry Grandfather,” Yuri said as he released him. “I’m here because you’re in the hospital. I’m here because you had a stroke. I was so worried about you. I had to come and check in to make sure that you were okay.”

“Oh, you didn’t have to do that!”

“Yes I did, you’re my grandfather. I don’t know how I would’ve forgiven myself if I hadn’t comed and you had passed away. I’m just so glad that you’re still here. I’m so glad that you survived.”

“Oh Yuratchka, don’t worry about me. Now, how’s training for the Grand Prix Final going,” Nicolai said, and they chatted together for a couple of hours before Nicolai   
started nodding off. 

“To make a full recovery, your Grandfather needs his rest. I’d suggest that you’d leave him to sleep now,” a nearby nurse said pointedly. 

“Okay, goodbye Grandfather,” Yuri said, giving his grandfather a tight hug before turning to walk out, and asking the nurse, “I know that he’s going to most likely have to use a cane to walk now, but are there any other complications because of his stroke that I should know about before I leave.”

“Not that I know of, besides that people who’ve already had one stroke are at a higher risk for having a second one,” the nurse told him.

‘Fuck,’ Yuri thought before he said to the nurse, “Thank you, tell my grandfather that I hope he recovers soon and to make sure to have his cell phone on and nearby so that I can call him!”

“Will do,” the nurse said, and Yuri walked out of the hospital, thankful to be out of the wretched building that only made him think of illness and death. Rationally, he knew that hospitals were where people went to be healed, but he could never stand to be in one. They just made his head fill even faster with worst case scenarios, and the air in them always felt too stiff to breathe freely. 

Yuri stopped at the rink, but far too many people were there for Yuri to be able to skate his worries away, so he went back to his hotel, his ears still ringing with the nurse’s warning that his grandfather was now more likely to have a second stroke, and Yuri reached for his phone to call Otabek.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: this chapter contains mentions of abuse and of abandonment

The phone dialed once before Otabek picked up and said, “Hi Yuri, how are you? How’s your grandfather doing?”

“Hi, I’m fine,” Yuri lied, and then honestly said, “He’s doing better, I got to talk to him for awhile today. He’s still really tired and it seems like he’ll be in the hospital for another day or two, but he’s doing well with his recovery, even if he will have to start walking with a cane, but honestly that’s not that big of a deal, even though I’m sure that he will complain about it constantly.”

“Okay, good, I’m glad that he’s doing better. But Yura, are you sure that you’re fine? If you don’t want to talk about it, that’s alright, I won’t pressure you or anything.”

“I’m still pretty shaken. I had never thought about the possibility of him passing away before. Seems kinda silly now, honestly. He is pretty old. God I’m such an idiot. And also, the nurse I was talking to said that those who had had strokes before were at a higher risk for having them again.” 

“I’m sorry. Thank you for telling me. And you are not an idiot. Don’t get mad at yourself for this, it’s not your fault.”

“Thanks Beka.” 

Otabek, feeling like even if Yuri might not think that he needed to talk through everything, that he probably did, decided to try and see if he could get Yuri to open up a bit more, “Hey, just wondering, I’ve always known that you and your grandfather are close, but why is that?”

Yuri sounded taken aback but replied nonetheless saying, “Well, he raised me.”

“How did that happen? Why didn’t your parents raise you? I’m sorry, that was rude, if you don’t want to talk about this that’s alright, just let me know.”

Yuri was quite surprised. Everybody seemed to know to leave the subject of his childhood and his parents alone, and therefore avoided the subject. Yuri was pretty sure that Otabek knew that as well, but there he was, asking anyways, which struck Yuri as quite odd. However, maybe it would be good for him to tell someone why his grandfather had raised him. He hadn’t actually told anyone before, but if he had to tell someone, he’d like it to be Otabek. So Yuri said, “No, I’ll talk about it. Maybe it will be good to say some of it outloud. But could we skype instead?”

“Sure, any particular reason?” 

“I just like skyping more than calling,” Yuri lied. The actual reason for wanting to skype was that he wanted to be able to see Otabek’s expressions. If Otabek started looking too worried or shocked or anything like that, Yuri would know, and he could either alter the story or just stop altogether, whichever ended up making more sense. 

It took them a few minutes to get skype set up but when they did, Otabek soothingly said, “Hi, feel free to start whenever you feel comfortable.”

Yuri took a deep breath and started, “I never met my father. I heard from Grandfather that he was a very kind man, but I wouldn’t know. The story that I’ve been told, be it the truth or not, I have no real of knowing. I don’t even know his name for fuck’s sake. But the story is that a few weeks before my birth he died. I don’t quite know how he died. I have one memory of my mother saying that he got in a horrible car crash, and another memory of her saying that he was struck by a really serious illness and never recovered. I don’t know what the actual truth is. Whenever I ask Grandfather about what happened to my dad he won’t say a thing. Because of the two different stories that my mom had told me about my dad’s death, I’ve always suspected that he isn’t dead. But instead, that he had run away from my mother, which honestly makes sense. But when he allegedly died, he would’ve known about the pregnancy. And I would think that maybe he would’ve tried to contact me or something. Or maybe he had run away because my mother was pregnant. Either way, it’s a whole lot easier to just say that he’s dead and try not to think about it too much.”

“I’m so so sorry Yuri…” Otabek said looking deeply saddened and troubled. “But no, I’m sure that it wasn’t your fault that your father left, if he did indeed leave instead of die. What was so bad about your mother?”

“I didn’t know her for very much of my life. I was only seven when she left me. It was never quiet when she was around, though. She wouldn’t stop yelling. Occasionally she was just yelling at the world, but most of the time it was at me. Me because I broke something. Me because I distracted her from something important. Me because I wanted to invite an acquaintance over and she didn’t have time for this. Me because I had started figure skating and wouldn’t shut up about it. Me because I couldn’t do one goddamn thing right. She would occasionally take out her anger in a more violent form, shoving me or hitting me, or throwing something across the room. That’s probably why I have such a short temper. Anger was what I was raised with. And, I was never sure when her next outburst would be, which was partly why I became so devoted to skating so quickly. It was an escape. Maybe she used to be kind. Maybe she used to be a wonderful person. I think that she must’ve been, because there are a few memories that stick out in my head of her being kind. Like when she let me help her make pirozhkis, gently guiding my hands to help her knead the dough. Or the time that she and I went on a brief trip to St. Petersburg to see the city. Or the time that she tried helping me learn how to read, and her eyes glistened with pride when I started to get the hang of it. But regardless, the pleasant memories of her are few and far between. She always seemed to hate me. It always felt like I was nothing but a bother, a useless piece of junk that was unnecessary and unwanted.”

Yuri paused for a moment, noticing how distressed Otabek looked at hearing this, but Yuri continued, deciding that he had told him this much, and so he may as well tell Otabek the rest, “When I was seven, she left. I don’t know why, though I imagine that it was probably because she didn’t want a child, or that she wanted a child and then had me, and maybe she would’ve liked having a different child, and just didn’t like having me. But, it’s best not to dwell on why she left, because she did leave, and that’s reality, so it doesn’t help anyone to waste time thinking of why. The day that she had left me had actually been a pretty pleasant one. It was close to christmas and she let me help her make cookies, and then we played a few simple card games. I suppose that she must’ve wanted my last memories of her to be pleasant ones. After that she suddenly got up, and pulled me with her. She told me to pack up my things, and that we were going to visit Grandfather and bring him cookies. She told me to pack everything in my room that I could fit into a suitcase, and meet her in the kitchen as soon as I was done, and told me to hurry.” 

As Yuri was walking Otabek through these memories, he noticed that he was crying, probably because this was the first time he had recounted the full story in years, and despite how long ago it was, the memories were just as painful. However, he continued nonetheless, “I was extremely confused as to what was going on, but didn’t ask any questions, seeing as I was only seven. We were soon at Grandfather’s house and she gave me the cookies and said that she was going out to the store to pick up some items. She then suddenly pulled me in for a hug and said, ‘I’ll always love you Yuri.’ That was the last time I saw her. For a while I thought that she was going to come back. But by the third day of her absence I had given up hope. I think Grandfather had realized when I got there that I was being left in his care. I’m still perplexed by her last words that she said to me. I still don’t understand how she could say that she’ll always love me before abandoning me. It’s because of that, I think, that the word love made me fearful and confused up until pretty recently. Once it finally hit me that my mother wasn’t coming back, I started crying. I didn’t stop until I passed out from exhaustion about a day and a half later. I was so upset after realizing that that was the last time that I would ever see my mother. I blamed myself for her leaving. I thought it was my fault. I still do, actually, but it’s less raw and painful now. Grandfather tried to comfort me, tried to persuade me off the ground with pirozhkis and sweets, but it was not until I had woken up after passing out that I was able to function again.”

Yuri tried to ignore how horrified Otabek looked and continued, “Up until I started competitive skating and being coached by Yakov in St. Petersburg, I lived with my grandfather. I still have no clue what happened to my mother. Around the time I turned ten, I would ask him every single day what had happened to her. I don’t know if he truthfully didn’t know or just didn’t want to tell me, but I never found out, and eventually pretended that I didn’t care. After the breakdown, after it hit me that she would never return, I learned to harden myself to the world, or at least I tried. I learned that the world was a terrible place where mothers and fathers, the people who are supposed to love you unconditionally, leave you for no apparent reason. I tried not to let my emotions show, knowing that if I released a little bit of what I was feeling, all of it would come flooding through.” 

“I stopped showing any emotions besides anger and slowly became more bitter, resentful, and angry at the world who had only proved to cause me pain. I didn’t try to make friends because I was afraid that they would end up leaving me. It wasn’t until I was 15 and met you that I began to allow myself to show emotions. To open up, bit by bit. It also wasn’t until then that I began to realize that it’s not a bad thing to open up to people. It wasn’t until then that I allowed myself to try and make a friend. And it wasn’t until recently that I realized that love wasn’t always a fake word, and it wasn’t until recently that I learned that love wasn’t a word to be afraid of. So, yeah, ever since my mother left, Grandfather was my parental figure. He’s always been so kind and loving and nurturing. He’s always supported my skating and been there in any way that I’ve needed and I’m so afraid to lose him. He’s the last family member that I have that I’m still in contact with. I don’t want to lose him as well,” Yuri finished, and by now it’s not silently crying, but full on sobbing. He hadn’t thought about it in so long. He had shoved it so far in the back of his mind and telling Otabek felt like he had just relived it. 

“Yura, it’s okay, it’s okay Yura. Try to take deep breaths, go get a glass of water. I know that telling me all of this must’ve been difficult for you, but, thank you for telling me. Now take a few deep breaths and get a glass of water, it will help,” Otabek said calmly and gently, meanwhile secretly shocked at how much hardship Yuri had gone through. 

Yuri did as instructed, and it did help a little bit, and he was no longer sobbing. He felt a bit embarrassed to have broken down like that in front of Otabek, but Otabek’s face was not filled with judgement or anything along those lines, but rather with worry and concern, as well as shock.

“I’m so sorry that this has all happened to you Yura. I know that me saying sorry isn’t particularly helpful, but I honestly don’t know what else to say. I wish that I could somehow turn back time and fix your past, but I can’t. It’s a good thing that you’re allowing yourself to show emotions again, and it’s a good thing that you’re not as afraid of the word love anymore. I’m so so sorry that you ever felt as though you had to hide your emotions and that you were ever afraid of the word love. I’m sorry for everything that happened in your childhood. It’s not right and I wish that there was something I could do to make it so that it had never happened,” Otabek said, struggling to find the right words to convey the message that he was trying to get across.

“Wait, Beka,” Yuri interjected, “Why are you crying?”

“I’m crying because I’m upset that you were hurt in this way. I’m crying because I can’t even begin to imagine what you’ve had to go through. I’m crying because I just want to give you a hug but I’m too far away. I’m crying because I always knew that you had the eyes of a soldier and I never knew why, and now I do. You have the eyes of a soldier. The eyes of someone who’s seen to much and been through too much in their life. I am so sorry that this happened to you Yura. I’m so so sorry.”

“It’s okay, go get a glass of water yourself, you’re right, it does help to stop crying.”

“I wish there was something I could do to help…” Otabek sighed after taking Yuri’s advice and getting a glass of water. 

“You already did do something.”

“What?”

“This was the first time I told anybody about what happened to my parents. Before, if anybody so much as began to ask me why Grandfather was taking care of me instead of my mom and dad, I would just glare at them until they knew that it would be wise to never ask again. I’ve been bottling it up for so long… I think it was good for me to tell somebody. Thank you for asking, and thank you for listening, it helped more than I ever would have realized. I hadn’t actually thought about it in so long. It was a subject that I wouldn’t let my brain touch. The memories are just too painful. Still too raw, even though they’re from such a long time ago. But I think that it was good for me to think about it again, and it was a lot easier and a lot less painful to be able to think about it with you listening. Thank you Beka.”

“I’m glad that it helped. Please, it’s good to open up, even if it’s difficul. Let me know if there’s anything I can do to help.” 

“Of course.”

“So, how long are you going to stay in Moscow,” Otabek said, changing the subject after deciding that it was probably best to let Yuri process the newly resurfaced memories that telling Otabek about his family had brought up. 

“Oh, fuck. I should probably see when the next flight is that I can get is so that I can practice for the Cup of China.”

“You sure that you don’t want to stay in Moscow any longer?”

“Yeah, it won’t help for me to be here, Grandfather is recovering well, and being here will just lead to me having too much time to dwell on my thoughts and my fears of losing him. Skating will be able to distract me from my thoughts. I need that right now.”

“Okay, make sure that you take time to dwell on your thoughts too though. It’s not good to block them up until you can’t take it anymore, okay? Call me if you need to talk.”

“I’ll try, thanks, bye, I should probably try and find a flight.”

“Goodbye Yura, I love you,” Otabek said, feeling like Yuri needed to know that he was loved right now, and when he saw Yuri smile softly, he knew that he was right.

“Goodbye, I love you too Beka,” Yuri said before hanging up and searching for flights.

Otabek could not fall asleep that night. He was in such shock at what Yuri had been through. Sure, you always heard the stories of people with abusive parents, or parents that abandoned them, but they were never stories of people who Otabek knew, and definitely not anybody Otabek was close with. It happening to Yuri made it feel so much more real, and so much more terrifying. 

Otabek couldn’t imagine it, honestly. Family had always been of great importance to him, and his family had always been very loving and supportive. He was torn when he figured out that to be competitive in figure skating, he would have to move away, and he was delighted when he was finally able to make his way back home and continue his skating career there. Family was always a word that was associated with many pleasant memories of him, his younger sister, his mom, and his dad, all doing something together. Maybe it was taking a walk through Almaty, or trying somewhere new for dinner. Maybe it was playing a board game together. Maybe it was the tearful reunions when Otabek was finally able to return back home for a brief while before returning to wherever he was training at the time.

He had countless pleasant memories, but he had next to no memories of anger within his family. Otabek can’t imagine a single time that his parents fought. Sure they occasionally bickered over what to have for supper that night, but it was never true anger. And similarly, it wasn’t like he and his sister weren’t prone to the occasional sibling fight, but it was always quickly resolved, and was forgotten as quickly as it had been started. His family was probably a large part of why he was always so calm. His family had taught him that there was a solution to every problem if you took a step back and took some time to look for a solution from a rational standpoint. He had been taught that getting upset over little things caused more problems than it solved, and that clear communication was the best way to resolve conflicts. His family had taught him that compromises were necessary and good, and that it was important to try and see problems from other people’s point of views as well as his own. His family had taught him so many things, but never anger or fear.

With Yuri though, his father left before he got a chance to meet him, and his mother was perpetually angry for no apparent reason. Otabek couldn’t help but figure that constant anger must either run in the family, or Yuri, having grown up with perpetual anger, just didn’t think anything of it and it was normal for him. Either way, it was such a different way to be raised. Otabek had been raised to value family, and to believe that family stuck together no matter what, and that family was a precious thing, and that to abandon family was one of the worst things that you could do. Yuri, however, was abandoned by his father before he was even born, then once again, except instead by his mother, when he was seven. Otabek couldn’t begin imagine how hard that must’ve been. It didn’t make sense to him how one could do that and still be able to live with themselves afterwards. And somehow, Yuri seemed to blame himself for this? It just didn’t make sense. 

And now here Yuri was, with his only family being his grandfather, who would likely pass away within the next couple of years. Here Yuri was, telling Otabek about some truly scarring events of his past, sounding like he was admitting some of the things he told Otabek to himself for the first time as they spoke. Here Yuri was, worried beyond belief at just the thought of his grandfather passing, desperately wanting to be with the only person in his family who hadn’t abandoned him for as long as possible. Otabek couldn’t believe what he had just been told. It just didn’t make sense…


	7. Chapter 7

Yuri had expected to be yelled at when he got back to St. Petersburg, but instead, Yakov went up to him and asked, “Is your grandfather alright?”

“Yeah, he’s going to be fine.” Yuri responded.

“Okay, good, let’s get back to work. Go warm up, and then we’ll work on refining your short program.”

Practice was tiring to say the least. He managed to land most of his jumps, which surprised him quite a bit. However, he felt like he was in a state of perpetual exhaustion.  Ever since returning to St. Petersburg, he hadn’t been able to get a good night’s sleep. He always managed asleep eventually, but he would lie awake for hours, his body drained, but his mind all too awake. His mind would fill itself with thoughts and worries. Every time his phone rang, be it night or day, he would worry that the person on the other end would inform him that his grandfather had had another stroke. At night his fears would only increase, heightened by the darkness enveloping him. At some point his thoughts would shift into dreams, but that always happened so late that practice was taking everything he had out of him. As soon as he drifted into sleep, his alarm would ring to force him up for the ridiculously early practice time, and he was simply exhausted.

After three days of this, though, Yuri was done with it. Done with his mind, done with his intrusive thoughts, and done with his inability to sleep. There were only two more days until they would have to leave for the Cup of China, and if he wanted to do semi decently in the competition, he had to be well rested. So, Yuri decided that the logical solution to this problem would be to train every second that he was awake. That way he would be so exhausted that he would fall asleep before his mind had time to start thinking. 

For the next two days Yuri was seldom seen off the ice. Yakov was quite surprised at this, since, in the past, Yuri would often do the opposite of this, and Yuri would be difficult to drag onto the ice, complaining all of practice and shouting swear words at anybody who had the misfortune to try and make conversations with him. After a few years of this happening, Yakov realized that this was Yuri’s way of relieving his stress, and though it wasn’t the healthiest of methods for doing so, Yakov figured that it was best to let the mess run it’s course, especially since Yuri was always less harsh by the competition, and rarely showed signs of being nervous.

Now, however, his pupil was pushing himself harder than ever. Yakov was actually quite worried that Yuri would injure himself right before the competition by overusing his muscles, or just from the general dangers that came with skating. The day before they were to leave he went up to Yuri and stopped him mid skate and angrily said, “You’re working yourself too hard! You’re going to hurt yourself just a day from the competition!!! Get off the ice! You can return after an hour, you need to give yourself a break.” 

‘No, that’s exactly what I need to not do. If I do that, I won’t be exhausted enough to fall asleep without having time to think first. And then I’ll be exhausted for the Cup of China and it will end terribly!’ Yuri thought to himself, but out loud he said, “Okay,” because he knew that it was pointless to argue with his coach, and went off the ice as he was instructed. 

Yakov was quite pleased that the boy had followed his instructions and went off the ice without saying a single swear word. What Yakov didn’t know was that as soon as Yuri got off the ice he went over to the ballet studio, pleased to see that Lilia was indeed there, who was more than willing to give her sharp, but useful criticism on the dance moves of his routine. Many people despised Lilia for her harshness, but that was the reason Yuri liked her. He came to her to get better, not to have her sugar coat her words to spare his feelings. 

The Cup of China came and went. Yuri was well rested, thanks to Lilia, who had spent the rest of the day breaking apart and rebuilding the dance components of his programs, and Yuri  won gold the next day.

  
  


Before Yuri knew it, it was the night before the Rostelecom Cup, and Yuri was soon drifting into sleep. 

_ “Yuri, your grandfather, he died while you were at the Rostelecom Cup. He had another stroke and couldn’t make it.” Yakov told Yuri.  _

_ “What!” was all that Yuri said before he raced off to Moscow to see if this troubling news was true.  _

_ Yuri found his grandfather in the same hospital and on the same bed as he had been when he had visited him after his grandfather’s first stroke. This time, it was clear that he was not alive, for no breaths moved through his body. His face, although it looked at peace, was oddly pale, and his eyes were shut tight. “Hello Yuratchka,” the corpse said in a serene tone.  _

_ “G-grandfather? Aren’t you, aren’t you dead?” Yuri said harshly, in shock at seeing a dead body talk. _

_ “Never one to be subtle, were you. And yes, I suppose I am dead. Maybe if you had been there, you could’ve given me the strength that I had needed to pull through, but alas, that’s not how things played out. I hope that you did well in the Rostelecom Cup though, even though it may have cost me my life. If you had been there, though, this body would probably still have breath flowing through it.” _

_ “What?” _

_ “You always gave me strength, seeing you always reminded me why I was here. And then you weren’t here, and life slipped through my fingers like grains of sand in somebody’s hand. Of course, it’s not your fault. But you being there would’ve helped…” _

_ “I’m sorry Grandfather! I didn’t know until the competition was over. If I had known, I would’ve come over right away!” _

_ “Would you have? Or would you have chosen your ice skating career over your own family.” _

_ “Yes I would’ve come, I swear! Of course I would’ve come! You mean so much to me, how could you say that I wouldn’t come!” Yuri shouted, desperately wishing that he could force his grandfather to believe what he said, to believe the truth. However, before Yuri could say anything else to convince his grandfather, he found himself falling into a pool of swirling blackness that he never seemed to reach the bottom of.  _

_ A voice pierced through the darkness and said, “Your mother and I could’ve been happy.” _

_ “What are you talking about? Who are you?” Yuri questioned at the mysterious, disembodied voice. _

_ “If you hadn’t been born, your mother and I could’ve been happy together. But I didn’t want to have children. I didn’t want you. And yet there we were, and it was only three weeks until your birth so I chose to leave so I wouldn’t have to deal with having a child that I didn’t want. I left because of you. You were what ruined our happiness Yuri. If you hadn’t been born, your mother and I would still be together and we would be happy, but you were going to be born, wrecking everything we had worked so hard to establish. Ruining a marriage that was going perfectly smoothly until you.  It’s your fault that I left, and it’s your fault that your mother isn’t happy.” _

_ It registered with Yuri that this was his father speaking, and he didn’t know what to do, he didn’t know what he could do, so he just choked out, “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry,” before the blackness completely enveloped him, leaving him to think about how once again, it was all his fault. His fault that his father left him. Without Yuri there, maybe Yuri’s mother would’ve smiled more. Maybe his father and his mother would still be together and be a beautiful, happy couple. But no, Yuri had been born, destroying everything, and ruining the happiness that had once existed.  _

_ And then it was light again. He was at his grandfather’s place, and his mother was saying her goodbyes to him. This was right when she was abandoning him. “I’ll always love you Yuri. Even if you are a bother that only make me want to scream. Even if it’s a miracle that I didn’t do any more serious physical harm. Even if you’re the reason I’m leaving. Even if I’m leaving because with you, I’ll never be able to achieve happiness. Even if you will never be able to please anybody, and you will never be able to bring people happiness. Even if I know that nobody will ever be able to be happy when they’re with you, and that you are like poison to everyone you interact with, I will always love you. Remember that Yuri.”  _

Yuri suddenly woke up. ‘It was just a dream, it was just a dream,’ Yuri reassured himself, still not fully believing it. ‘I’m okay, I’m okay.’ But he wasn’t okay, and after a few minutes of sitting there in shock, he couldn’t hold back his emotions any longer, so he started sobbing. That dream had brought up too many things that he had been ignoring for so long. Too many thoughts that had  been flitting underneath his subconscious while Yuri refused to recognize that they existed.

Without thinking, Yuri grabbed his phone and called Otabek, fully expecting that he wouldn’t answer, for it only registered that it was 6 am in Kazakhstan much later.. Otabek answered very quickly saying, “Yuri?!? What’s going on? Why are you calling me? It’s 3 am for you! Are you alright?”

For a long minute, Otabek only heard sobbing, and he was deeply concerned about his friend, and Yuri finally responded, barely choking out, “Nightmare,” before continuing to sob. 

“It’s okay Yura. It wasn’t real, whatever it was, it wasn’t real.” Otabek said gently before starting to talk about what happened the previous day to distract Yuri from whatever he was thinking about.

After a while, Yuri stopped crying, and interrupted Otabek by saying, “It was my grandfather. He was dead. And it, it was my fault. He told me that he would’ve survived if I had been there, but I didn’t know since I had been competing in the Rostelecom Cup when he passed. But it was my fault…” Yuri trailed back into tears, his voice choking up, refusing to let words slip through, although, the crying was more muffled this time instead of the violent sobbing. Recounting this dream was difficult and painful, but Yuri continued anyways, “And then I heard my father’s voice telling me that he had never wanted me. That I was the reason that he left my mother. That he had never wanted a child, that he had never wanted me. That if it wasn’t for me, they would’ve been happy together. And then I was back at the day that my mother left me. And she told me that she was leaving because of me. She was leaving because it was her only shot at happiness. She told me that I was like poison to everyone I interacted with, spreading unhappiness wherever I went…” Yuri finished, going back to sobbing. He couldn’t quite place why this had hurt him so much, it just did. 

“It was just a dream, it’s not real, and it’s not true,” Otabek soothed softly and comfortingly, and once he heard Yuri’s breath regulate, he continued, saying, “It would never be your fault if your grandfather died. You can’t blame yourself for human mortality. He is an old man, and one day he will get to see whatever comes next, and no matter how much it hurts, there’s nothing you can do to prevent this. It’s not your fault that your father left, it’s really not. I doubt that your father left because of the pregnancy, since, if that was the case, he would’ve left sooner than three weeks before your birth. And even if he didn’t want to have a child, if he had stuck around to watch you grow up, he would’ve been glad that he did have one. But you weren’t even born yet, how could it be your fault? And it’s also not your fault that your mother left. She didn’t allow you to bring her happiness. Instead, she soured your relationship by being constantly angry, which only made things worse for both you and her.” 

“Beka?” Yuri asked. 

“Yes Yura?” Otabek responded. 

“Are you unhappy when you’re around me? Do I spread poison to you as well, just by interacting with you?” Yuri said softly, and as Yuri spoke, it was surprising how small and child like Yuri sounded while asking this. Otabek thought that he also heard one more thing behind Yuri’s voice. Something that sounded distinctly like fear. 

“What? Of course not. I don’t talk with very many people, you know. I wouldn’t be talking with you if you made me unhappy. You are not like poison by any means. Oh Yura… Yura you don’t make me unhappy in any way. You make me so so so happy Yura, how could you make me anything except happy.” 

“Thank you, Beka, and you make me happy as well.”

“You should try getting some more sleep, Yura. You have the Rostelecom Cup later, right?”

“Yeah, ugh.” 

“Goodnight Yura.”

“Hey, hey Beka?”

“Yeah?”

“Could you just keep talking to me until I fall asleep? I’m sure that it won’t be long, I just don’t trust myself with my thoughts,” Yuri asked.

“Of course,” Otabek obliged, once again surprised at how young Yuri sounded when asking this, and then it hit him. Yuri was shaken, and probably scared by what he had just dreamed of. ‘I hope this doesn’t affect his Rostelecom Cup performance’ Otabek thought before continuing to tell Yuri pleasant stories until an hour later when he heard the Russian begin to snore.

  
  


Morning came all too soon for Yuri and soon he was about to compete in the Rostelecom Cup. But even though talking to Otabek after his nightmare had helped, he just couldn’t focus. Yakov noticed that Yuri wasn’t his normal self and asked, “Yuri, are you alright?”

“Yes, I’m fine.” Yuri snapped. 

“Are you sure?” Yakov said. Normally Yuri wasn’t snapping at people until after competitions when the press were pestering everyone and Yuri just wanted to go home. During the actual competition, Yuri was too focused and determined to be angry with everybody else.

“Yes, Yakov, I’m sure that’s I’m fine,” Yuri said, as if he was trying to convince himself of it as well as Yakov, before moving away from his coach to go onto the ice for the warm up. 

‘That boy definitely didn’t get enough sleep,’ Yakov thought, ‘It better not make him mess up today.’ 

But it did mess him up. The short program, in Yuri’s opinion, was a disaster. He had four quads in the program and had only managed to land one of them well. His performance components weren’t very high scoring either. His theme for this season was tranquility, something that at the beginning of the season had made sense. It had been something new in his life, albeit welcome, and he had wanted to express this new emotion through his skating. However tranquility was just about the opposite of what he was feeling right now, and he just couldn’t make his performance seem genuine. 

“Yuri, pull yourself together before the free skate,” Lilia told him sharply. 

“Okay,” Yuri said, looking down at his feet. 

“And keep your chin up. Prima ballerinas do not sulk when they don’t perform their best. No. They just become more determined to do better the next time!” 

“Thank you,” Yuri said before he tried to find a more secluded part of the arena to try and sort everything out. 

Once he had found an area clear of people he lost all of the composure that remained with him, and started kicking the benches that were near him, as well as the wall, as well as shouting swear words at himself, the world, and his stupid dream. Doing this helped calm him down. Even if it wasn’t exactly healthy, he had still needed an outlet for all of his anger that had built up due to his disappointing performance and his frustrating dream. Once he had gotten through all his anger his mind felt a lot more clear and he suddenly found himself asking himself whether his grandfather would like it if Yuri screwed up his performance because he was worried about him. And then he realized that no. His grandfather would be quite disappointed, and probably angry with himself. His grandfather had always cared about Yuri more than anything else, and had always tried to help Yuri succeed, especially succeed at the things that made Yuri happy. That was why he supported Yuri’s skating career, even though it was financially draining before Yuri began to get sponsors. So, Yuri couldn’t let his grandfather down. He had to stop worrying, if only temporarily, so that he could skate his best. 

He went back to the rink and Yakov told him, “You better nail your free skate tomorrow if you want to go to the Grand Prix Finals, Yuri. You’re currently in fifth place.”

“Damn it,” Yuri muttered. 

“Language, Yuri,” Lilia said sternly, “Are you doing better now?” 

“Yeah,” Yuri said in response. 

“Good,” she and Yakov said together, and then they made their way to the hotel, Yakov and Lilia having to restrain Yuri from strangling an obnoxious reporter who had asked if there was a reason for his poor performance along the way. 

Before skating, Yuri tried to take some deep breaths, and when he went onto the ice, he tells himself that his grandfather would want him to skate well today. And, true to his determination, his free skate was absolutely flawless. He still couldn’t get the performance points that he was hoping for, because no matter how much he tried, he couldn’t appear peaceful. However, he scored very well with his technical points. However, he still didn’t know if it had been enough to get him into the Grand Prix Final. 

It had been enough, but barely. He got third place, and it was all Yakov and Lilia could do to keep Yuri from swearing at his competitors and the judges and anybody who dared to cross his path. “Prima ballerinas must alway keep their composure, Yuri,” Lilia harshly reminded whenever necessary. 

“That’s right, and besides, you’re still going to go to the Grand Prix Final and you’ll be able to do better then, so no harm done,” Yakov reassured as Yuri glared at him. He had barely made it to the podium and barely made it to the final. This wasn’t okay. This wasn’t normal.He was better than this. He was going to do better than this at the Final, he was sure of it. He just needed to somehow make sure that nothing else would go wrong so he wouldn’t be distracted and screw everything up.


	8. Chapter 8

It was the night before the Grand Prix Final, which this year was being hosted in London, England, and Yuri was finally feeling at least slightly tranquil. He and Otabek were biking through the city, seeing historical landmarks and occasionally stopping at random restaurants for a bite to eat, or stopping at a museum that they felt was worth their time. Yuri felt actually in control, and relaxed, and he couldn’t even judge how long it had been since that happened. He was never really one to relax in the first place, seeing that relaxing is pretty difficult when you’re a professional figure skater, but his life had been thrown into even more turmoil than usual since his grandfather’s stroke. 

Interrupting the peaceful silence that had filled the air was Yuri’s phone, ringing incessantly until he picked up and said, “Hello?”

“Hi, are you Yuri Plisetsky?” said the person on the other end. 

“Yes, why are you calling me,” Yuri snapped, annoyed that this person had interrupted the perfectness of beforehand, and surprised, because it was rare that he didn’t recognize the voice on the other end of the phone.

“I’m calling to tell you that your grandfather, Nikolai Plisetsky, had another stroke this afternoon, and by the time that help came, he had passed away. I’m very sorry for your loss, Mr. Plisetsky,” the person finished and Yuri hung up. 

“What was that phone call about?” Otabek inquired, pulling the motorcycle to a stop. 

“It was nothing,” Yuri said sharply, not believing what he had been told, and not wanting to recognize it as the truth. 

“It doesn’t sound like nothing, Yura.”

“Well, it was.” 

“If you don’t want to talk about something, it’s always fine to just say so, okay?”

“Okay, I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Okay,” Otabek said, running the motorcycle once more so that they could continue to meander around the city. 

Yuri felt bad for snapping at Otabek but if he were to say what he had just been told aloud, that would only make everything so much more real and so much more painful. For the time being he had to just try and believe that it wasn’t actually happening, that it was just a mistake and that his grandfather was alive and healthy. Denial was the only logical way to deal with this. He wouldn’t be able to handle it if he allowed himself to realize that his grandfather was actually dead. His grandfather had always been there for him, through everything. His grandfather had been the one to encourage him to skate and to foster that interest, despite the original financial toll. His grandfather had been the one to always offer Yuri a kind word, even if Yuri only snapped back at him in response. His grandfather had been the one to comfort Yuri as a child before he got used to not having a mom. His grandfather had been the one to raise him, being kind and calm and compassionate and loving and the best caregiver that there ever could have been. His grandfather had been an integral part of his life, even when he had moved to St. Petersburg, and he just couldn’t accept that his grandfather would no longer be a part of his life.

And now, he was gone. Now, he would never be able to visit his grandfather’s house in Moscow again. Now, he would never see his grandfather cheering him on during a competition again. Now, he would never get to eat another one of his grandfather’s delicious pirozhkis. Now, he would never again be able to hug his grandfather and remind him of how thankful he was for everything his grandfather had done for him. Now he would never be able to know that no matter what, his grandfather would be there. Now, Yuri would never have a family again. Now, he would never so much as have the chance to say goodbye.

And fuck. Now Yuri was thinking about how his grandfather was gone and he was sobbing into Otabek’s back as they traveled throughout the city.

  
  


Otabek decided that enough was enough when he noticed that Yuri was sobbing against his back. He couldn’t force Yuri to tell him what was wrong but he figured that Yuri probably needed to talk about what was going on, and just needed a little gentle prodding before he would tell him. And if he still wanted to talk, they could at least get off of the motorcycle and find something that would serve as a distraction, and get Yuri some tissues. Otabek decided to circle back to a park that they had passed a short while ago and once they got there he lead Yuri off of the motorcycle and to a nearby bench, enveloping him in a hug once Yuri sat down beside him. 

They sat there in silence, except for Yuri’s sobs, for a few minutes, until Otabek broke the quiet and asked, “Yura, what’s wrong?”

“It’s nothing,” Yuri grumbled, refusing to make eye contact with Otabek.

“I know that it’s not nothing, Yura, and, you know, talking through it won’t hurt. And not talking about it doesn’t make whatever it is that’s going on disappear,” Otabek said calmly. 

“Okay,” Yuri said and took a deep breath before saying, “It’s my grandfather…” Yuri’s voice trailed off as he broke into more sobs. Saying it aloud was just too much. 

“What happened. Is he alright?” 

“No.”

“How bad is it.” 

“Beka, he’s, he’s dead…” Yuri choked out before folding in on himself by pulling his knees up to his chest, so that he could be as small as possible. Maybe if he took up less space, he would end up feeling less pain.

For a while Otabek said nothing. He didn’t know what he could say that would be able to comfort Yuri, and he was in a bit of shock at this news, though he knew that it couldn’t begin to compare to how Yuri was feeling. So, he just pulled Yuri into a tight hug, and said, “I’m so sorry, Yura, I’m so sorry.”

“Beka, what do I do now,” Yuri said after a few minutes, his voice shaking, “What if he would’ve been fine if I had been there. What if I had been there… Maybe he would’ve survived. And if I had been with him at the time… If I had just given up the Grand Prix for this year and moved back to Moscow to help him… Maybe he would still be here… I shouldn’t have been so goddamn selfish. I should’ve moved back to help him I’m such a fucking idiot!” Yuri’s sobs had now stopped, though the tears still ran down his cheeks, but now there was something other than sadness. Anger. 

“Hey, Yura?”

“Yeah?”

“This wasn’t your fault. I’m so sorry that your grandfather died, however, it’s not your fault. Your grandfather was an old man, and there’s only so long that one can outrun death. It was his time to go, and so he went. Your being there wouldn’t have caused him to survive. It wasn’t being selfish for you to continue skating. You being in Moscow wouldn’t have helped. You wouldn’t have been able to prevent another stroke, even if you had been there. And besides, didn’t you say that your grandfather had always supported your skating? Didn’t you say that he had always wanted to see you succeed? He wouldn’t have wanted you to miss competing because of his health, I don’t think. There’s only so long a person can live, and he reached the end of his life, and there wouldn’t have been anything you could’ve done to prevent this, so don’t blame yourself. I’m so sorry that he’s gone, Yura, I’m so sorry.” 

They sat there for a few minutes, Yuri slowly processing what he had been told then Yuri said, “I wish it were my fault. It makes more sense when something’s a person’s fault, not a true fact, like human mortality.” 

“Not everything is somebody’s fault. Assigning blame doesn’t make anything easier you know…”

“It sure makes things seem a lot easier,” Yuri countered.

“Well it doesn’t make them truly easier. It’s just a coping mechanism that often ends up hurting others or yourself rather than fixing whatever is going on.” 

“I suppose…” Yuri said quietly, his voice hardly more than a whisper. Then he continued by saying, “Grandfather, he was the last of my family…”

“I know,” Otabek said softly, hugging Yuri tighter still, as if he could somehow shield Yuri from all the pain, sadness, grief, and inner turmoil that he was now experiencing, just by hugging him. 

“Now it’s just me,” Yur said with a sigh, and a far off look in his eyes. The look was wistful, Otabek decided, as if Yuri was imagining what his life would have been like if his parents had been a major and positive part of it. 

“Your biological family being gone doesn’t mean that you’re alone…” Otabek responded. 

“Thank you,” Yuri said softly.

  
  


The next day came all too quickly, the world not giving Yuri the time that he needed to think through everything, or to so much as begin to process his grief. Nope, no time to do that. Instead he would have to compete in the stupid Grand Prix Final. And right now, Yuri didn’t exactly feel like performing. Or being in public at all really. Instead, what Yuri wanted to do was  curl up in his bed and cry for a few hours, and then head over to Moscow to see if everything was true. But nope, he had to fucking compete. Something that Yuri was sure wouldn’t end in his favor. 

“Why do you look so tired? Did you sleep at all?” Yakov asked harshly, having no idea of what had happened.

“I slept fine,” Yuri lied. Every time he began to drift off to sleep, he would see his grandfather’s body, pale and lifeless, and would jolt awake. After this occurring a couple of times, Yuri gave up on trying to fall ssleep, and instead tried to distract himself from his thoughts.

Otabek, who was with his coach nearby, went over to Yakov. He figured that Yuri was never going to tell his coach what was going on, and if Yuri didn’t tell Yakov, Yakov would be extremely harsh on Yuri because Yuri definitely wasn’t going to be his regular self, both on the ice and of. “Hey, Yakov, can I talk to you for a moment?” 

Yakov followed Otabek down to an area without any skaters, and most importantly, without any reporters, and said, “What.” 

“Don’t be too harsh on Yuri today. I doubt he slept a wink last night. He just found out that his grandfather died yesterday,” Otabek said, then began to walk away. 

“Thank you,” Yakov replied, thinking that Otabek and Yuri must’ve been a lot closer than he originally thought. Otabek, from what he had observed, hardly spoke to anybody, and normally when something bad happened, Yuri would close in on himself and wouldn’t let anybody help him. Pus, Otabek cared enough about Yuri to warn him to be less harsh with Yuri, which was a much needed warning, for he rarely let his students have any slack. 

Yakov returned upstairs to find a scowling Yuri, and quietly said, “I’m sorry about your grandfather, Yuri.” 

Yuri shot him a questioning look, then realized that he had just gone off with Otabek a few minutes ago. Yuri realized that Otabek must’ve told Yakov, probably to prevent Yakov from being angry at Yuri for being so distracted. Yuri made a mental note to thank Otabek later and then turned to Yakov and said, “Thanks, it’s fine though.” 

“Make sure that it doesn’t distract you today, though. I know that it’s easier said than done but you won’t be at your best if this is all you can think of during a performance about peace and tranquility,” Yakov reminded sternly. 

‘Of course I would get a lecture immediately after that moment of kindness. I guess this is Yakov after all,’ Yuri thought and then solemnly said, “It won’t distract me,” even though he didn’t know how he would manage it.

Yakov, obviously not believing Yuri, replied, “Okay, let me know if you need anything else.” 

“I’m fine,” Yuri snapped. At this point, he really didn’t want to talk about was going on. It was hard enough to talk about it with Otabek last night, and that was with Otabek, the one person that Yuri was actually comfortable talking openly with. So having another person knowing what was going on just wasn’t going to be good and would just make him him more uncomfortable. What would be best, really, was if Yuri could just shut his mind off for the next 48 hours so he wouldn’t be able to think about it during his performances, and therefore wouldn’t manage to screw everything up.

  
  


It was almost time for Yuri’s short program to start and he began to try and shut his brain off, because really, that was the only way that Yuri was going to get through this program. ‘I can deal with everything after the competition. When the competition is over, my problems will still be there. But for now I have to focus on the task at hand. One problem at a time. First, complete the competition. Then, deal with everything else. You can get through this skate, and then the next one. You just need to stop yourself from thinking about Grandfather and instead think about peace and tranquility and shit. How the hell did you even pick this fucking theme. What were you even thinking?’ Yuri thought to himself.

He went out onto the ice and began skating. It went smoothly for a while. His mind was blank, numb even, and if there was something running through it, it was just about what the next motions would be, or how to perfectly land the upcoming jump. For a while it was flawless. Yuri was halfway through the program and it began to feel like he might actually be able to get through his short program smoothly. Sure, he still wasn’t getting any good performance points, but he at least was able to nail all his jumps thus far. 

However, just as Yuri was entering the second half of his program, his mind flashed to the previous night. He remembered that that was the most that he had cried since his mother left him with his grandfather. He, conveniently enough, thought of this just as he was jumping, and he fell, but he immediately got up, so no real harm had been done. He continued with his program, thinking to himself, ‘No, don’t think about that. You can think all you fucking want in a few minutes, or preferably when this whole ordeal is done, but right now please actually be quiet for once!’

Otabek was watching from the audience and was holding his breath. He was honestly quite surprised that Yuri had managed to land his jumps in the first half. Yuri looked like he hadn’t slept at all, and most skaters would barely be able to step onto the ice if they didn’t get any sleep, let alone perform complicated jumps. However, Yuri’s theme was peace and tranquility and this performance was the opposite. Yuri was scowling, his eyes dark, with confusion and sadness occasionally flashing through them. Instead of his usual relaxed and flowing motions, he was much more rigid and tense, as if he had forgotten everything from his years of ballet. Occasionally Yuri’s face would screw up in concentration, as if he was willing himself not to think. 

When Yuri fell, Otabek wasn’t surprised, although he was quite relieved when Yuri automatically got up and continued, barely missing a beat in the music. However, Otabek was pretty sure that he knew what was going on, why Yuri was so stiff and his eyes so clouded, He was trying to force himself not to think. That tactic was not a wise one, in Otabek’s opinion, because trying not to think about something normally makes you only manage to think about it more. Even though it was counterintuitive, it was normally the case, so it was more practical to try to convey all the emotions you were feeling into whatever you were performing. Even if the emotions that you were feeling didn’t quite fit the theme, it would still end better because that way instead of blocking out your emotions you channeled them in a healthy fashion. 

Yuri messed up once more, hand touching down while landing, before his short program was over and when he finished, Yuri was relieved. It definitely wasn’t his best performance, but given the circumstances, Yuri had thought that he wouldn’t even make it through the entire program. His score wasn’t terribly high, due to the falls and the poor performance, but Yuri was sure that he was going to score much lower, and afterwards, Yakov told him, “You’ll be able to close the gap with your free skate performance.” 

After both Yuri and Otabek had performed their short programs, Otabek came up to Yuri and told him, “Hey, just so you know, tomorrow, with your free skate, try not to block out your emotions. That way your emotions won’t end up blocking you while you’re trying to block them. Instead, just let them roll over you. It’s better than just keeping them shut off. It doesn’t help to close off emotions, it just makes everything harder when all you can concentrate on is not thinking about whatever it is you’re trying to block off. So just try to let the emotions come and go instead of not letting yourself feel them, okay Yura?”

“Okay?” Yuri said, looking completely bewildered. 

“I mean that while you're skating, instead of focusing on not letting yourself feel emotions,” Otabek explained after noticing Yuri’s confused expression, “Let yourself feel them. Let them wash over you, each thought coming and going. Just let yourself feel emotions without letting them stop you. Emotions don’t have to be blocks that get in your way. That can also be blocks that you use to build stuff. So if a troubling thought comes by during your performance allow yourself to think about it and try to use it to fuel your performance and make you do even better. Does that make sense?” 

“Yeah.” Yuri responded, “Yeah, it does, thanks Beka, how the hell are you even so smart.” 

“It’s just one of the things that one of my coaches always lectured us on because she firmly believed that all messed up jumps were due to people letting emotions get in their way instead of letting their emotions lead the way and such.” 

“Okay, cool. By the way, your short program was amazing.” 

“Thanks, your short program was great as well.” 

“Don’t lie to me Beka. I know that it was shit. I was just distracted.” 

“It wasn’t that bad, and you’ll do better with your free skate, okay?” 

“Okay. And speaking of which we should probably go and get some rest before it.”

“Yeah,” Otabek said and they went back to their hotel.

 

After another fitful night’s sleep, it was time for the free skate. Soon enough, it was Yuri’s turn to perform and Otabek called out, “Davai!” and gave Yuri a thumb’s up. Then, Yuri started to skate. 

As he skated, he started to think, ‘How the hell am I supposed to just let thoughts roll over me. There are so many things that want to be running through my head and if I let them be free I’ll just drown in my own mind. It doesn’t make sense. I can’t think about Grandfather or my nonexistent family. I just can’t. It’s not an option right now. Oh fuck. I’m scowling again. How am I supposed to look at peace when it feels like everything around me is crashing down. Shit I can’t think about how everything is crashing down right now!’ Yuri missed his first jump, falling down and taking just a second too long to get up. It was even a relatively easy jump for him, only a triple toe loop. ‘Ugh how am I going to get through this program!’ 

He continued skating, missing yet another jump, though this time he hadn’t completely expected to get it, seeing that it was a quad. However, a small voice in his head nagged that he should at least try out Otabek’s advice. It did seem relatively reasonable in theory, maybe it could work in practice? ‘Just try it,’ he thought to himself, ‘What’s the worst that can happen? You miss another jump? You’ve already missed two of them, it won’t matter too much if you miss a third one.’ 

As Yuri kept on skating, he started thinking about how he would never see his grandfather again. He started to scold himself for thinking about this, but stopped himself and thought, ‘I can do this. I’m allowed to feel this. I’m allowed to use this to my advantage. I just need to let it go through my mind until I’m no longer thinking about it instead of preventing myself from thinking about it in the first place.’ So he kept skating, letting himself think about how his grandfather was dead, but not letting it get stuck in his mind, not letting the thought get caught in a constant loop, circling around and around with no meaning and no end. Instead. Yuri just let himself think freely without trying to control how he was thinking, without getting angry with himself because of what he was thinking, and soon enough the thought had left, and he hadn’t messed up his jump that he had had to do. 

‘Okay,’ Yuri thought, ‘Otabek might be onto something with this.’ Yuri finally felt his scowl lessen into a softer expression, and his motions become less rigid as he let himself think  whatever thought came to mind instead of sorting his thoughts into what he wanted to think about and what he didn’t want to think about, and only thinking about what he had decided that he wanted to think about. It was actually quite calming and Yuri didn’t mess up any more jumps in his free skate. By the time he was done, he was exhausted both physically and mentally, but at least he had gotten through the entire thing. 

When he got off of the ice, Yakov told him, “The beginning was a bit rough, but after that it was astounding. I think that that’s probably the best you’ve ever skated that ending!” 

 

The scores had been announced and Yuri could feel the tears welling up in his eyes. Sure, he wasn’t surprised that this had happened. His short program had been absolute shit, and his free skate wasn’t top notch either. He just wasn’t used to failure. That’s not to say that he always won gold, or anything like that. But ever since he entered the senior division, he had at least been on the podium, helped by the fact that he remained at the same height, the excessive physical exertion stunting his growth. It felt odd, actually, being in the audience instead of on the ice with a medal slung around his neck. And he probably wasn’t just upset because he got fifth place. Not even fourth, but fifth fucking place. But he was also upset because the reality that he would never see his grandfather alive again was slowly sinking in again. 

Nonetheless, Yuri was clapping loudly and enthusiastically, for Otabek had just won silver. Yuri also wasn’t surprised by this. Otabek had been fantastic, and they had often shared the podium, though it was always a bit of a toss up as to who won gold. Yuri wasn’t upset or anything childish like that that Otabek had placed and he hadn’t, rather, he was quite happy for Otabek, because he really deserved this, though Yuri thought, and was willing to argue, that he deserved gold more than he deserved silver. 

The way back to the hotel consisted of Lilia lecturing him on how he was to keep his chin up, and that he would be going to the banquet, no matter how much he might complain, because he must show his grace and not be a sore loser of any sorts. As well as that, Lilia reminded him that swearing at reporters was extremely rude, even if the reporters were rude themselves for their accusations regarding Yuri’s performance. Yakov, on the other hand, spent the time trying to stop Lilia’s lecture to tell Yuri that he was sure that Yuri would do better next season, until Lilia and Yakov were both talking over each other and it dissolved into the usual bickering. Yuri couldn’t help but wonder how these two had ever managed to date each other without one of them murdering the other. However, Yuri then remembered how passionate and dedicated Yakov and Lilia each are to their work, and how much they value effort and determination and obedience, and Yuri had to admit that it sort of made sense. 

Once Yuri was in his hotel room, he collapsed. He had gotten minimal amounts of sleep the previous two nighs, and the two days had been mentally and physically draining. As soon as he fell onto his bed, he was asleep. 

Yuri didn’t know how long he was asleep, but he woke up with a start when he heard knocking. He assumed that it was Yakov or Lilia coming to collect him for the banquet, an ordeal that he was not looking forward to. However, Yuri was pleasantly surprised when he opened the door to see Otabek instead. 

“Otabek? What are you doing here?” 

Instead of answering Yuri’s question, Otabek replied with, “You don’t want to go to the banquet, do you?”

“Of course not. Why the hell would I want to go to that stupid thing. Unfortunately, Lilia has already made it quite clear that I will be going even if she has to drag me there herself.” 

“So let’s go.” 

“Huh?” 

“It’s an hour and a half before the banquet. Either Yakov or Lilia will be here to get you soon enough, so let’s go before they come.” 

“Go where?” 

“Anywhere, just not the banquet. If you’re not in your room, they won’t be able to find you and you won’t have to go to the banquet.” 

The realization of what Otabek meant suddenly dawned on Yuri and he said, “That’s an amazing idea. I agree, let’s go. Congratulations on your silver, by the way. Your performances were amazing. But those judges’s eyes must have something wrong with them, because anybody with decent vision could tell that you deserved gold.” 

“You mean, you’re not mad?” 

“Of course I’m not mad. I’m upset with myself, sure, but I’m really happy for you!” 

“Oh, okay, thank you.” 

“Yup, now let’s go before Yakov and Lilia get here and murder me for trying to sneak out.” 

They rode around the city for a little bit until they found a quaint looking cafe and decided to have dinner there. 

“Hey, won’t your coaches be mad that you skipped the banquet?” Yuri asked after his phone rang from Yakov calling him for the fifth time in a row. 

“Eh, they don’t really care. It’s not like I would talk to anybody if I were at the banquet. They’re well aware of how socially inept I am, so they usually allow me to skip it.” 

“I guess that makes sense. Lilia always forces me to go because I am supposed to be graceful and hold my poise and be prim and proper and shit. Trust me, you’re not missing out on anything by not going.” 

They continued quietly chatting and eating their food, and before they knew it, the cafe was closing for the night. They drove around the city, Otabek having to drag Yuri away from a closed store with a pair of tiger print patterned ice skates in the display. When they made their way back to the hotel, Otabek turned to Yuri as they were walking in and said, “Um, it’s almost Christmas time now, and I was maybe wondering if you would you maybe like to spend Christmas with my family?”

“What?” Yuri asked, surprised. He had forgotten that it was almost Christmas, since it was never a major holiday, New Years Eve being a bigger deal in Russia. 

“If you don’t want to, that’s okay, I just thought that I’d offer…” Otabek said nervously. 

“No, no, I was just surprised that you had asked! I’d love to spend Christmas with you,” Yuri said and hugged Otabek tightly, saying, “Thank you so much Beka.” 

“You’re welcome Yura,” Otabek responded, and when they pulled away he said, “Yura, are you crying? What’s wrong?” 

“Nothing’s wrong. I just really appreciate how you’ve been here for me with everything going on with my grandfather… And now you’re inviting me to spend christmas with you and your family? I’m so grateful, and I really don’t deserve to have a friend like you…”

“Of course you do, now goodnight Yura, good luck with Yakov and Lilia.”

“Thanks, I’ll need it. I love you Beka.” 

“I love you too.” Otabek said and Yuri walked away to his hotel room. Sure, Yakov and Lilia were going to murder him tomorrow, but for right now at least, everything seemed like it was going to be alright. 


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I really have no clue what to name Otabek’s family members so for the time being their names are names found on a list of popular Kazakh names. If you have any suggestions for other names, please comment!

Yuri was, quite frankly, in shock. The weeks leading up to going to Otabek’s for Christmas had been hard, because he had to get all of his grandfather’s affairs in order, and hold a funeral, which he had decided was harder than winning the Grand Prix Final at 15, and Yuri was sure that he only got through it because Otabek was taking the time to help him through it, always willing to give advice, or just listen and comfort Yuri. But now it was almost Christmas and Yuri was simply in shock. He had arrived at the Altin house a few days ago and though he was slowly getting used to Otabek’s family and home, it was difficult, since everything was just so different. 

And Yuri doesn’t mean that in a bad way at all. He means it in a very good way. He’s just never been around this little yelling in his life. Growing up his mother was always yelling at him, and having Yakov as his coach, there was always going to be some yelling. But here? Not once had a single person raised their voice in the time that he had been there. It just felt sort of strange.

Another thing that was strange was that Yuri was not used to being doted on. But from the second he walked in the door, Otabek’s mother, Alina, was very affectionate and kind, almost saccharine, always asking if he needed anything, and telling him to eat more, because he was far too skinny, as well as asking him to call her Alina instead of Mrs. Altin. She talked to him as if he were her own child, and Yuri had to admit, it wasn’t unpleasant to be treated this way.

He was also shocked because he had a vague awareness that Otabek had a younger sister, but Yuri had no idea that Otabek’s younger sister, Madina, was the polar opposite of Otabek. She would not stop talking for a single second, and was constantly on some form of social media or another. Though Yuri had made a valiant effort, he had not yet managed to persuade Otabek to get so much as an instagram, so Yuri had assumed that it was something with their family not liking phones or something. But Madina proved him very wrong. He was also surprised when Otabek and Madina started bickering over what tv show to watch. Otabek was always so cool, calm, and collected that he had never imagined Otabek bickering with somebody over a matter as seemingly trivial as what tv show they would watch, even though there was a considerable age gap, Madina being 15, and Otabek now 23. 

Otabek’s father, Damir, had tried to interfere so as to stop the argument by saying, “Children, if you don’t calm down then we just won’t watch anything.” 

However, this had only served to make the situation worse, leading Madina to start yelling at Otabek to stop being so stubborn, and Otabek yelling at Madina to just let him choose what to watch, just this once.

In the end, it was Yuri who managed to calm them down, suggesting that they just play a board game instead, and soon enough, The Altin family and Yuri were all gathered around a table playing an intense game of monopoly.

The game grew more and more heated as Alina dominated over an entire side of the board, which Yuri dubbed as, ‘Death Valley,’ and Otabek, who was the banker, tried to take ‘loans’ from the bank. Madina, however, caught Otabek in the act, shoving him playfully when and then forcing him to return the money. 

“Can’t we just be done now,” Damir groaned, “We’ve been playing for two and a half hours, and it’s pretty clear at this point that Alina is going to win.” 

“No!” Otabek, Madina, Alina, and Yuri shouted all at once. 

“We have to finish! We can’t just forfeit and admit defeat!” Otabek said. 

“Yeah, I was just about to make a comeback!” Madina chimed in. 

“No you weren’t. I was just about to win!” Alina countered with a smug expression. 

Yuri just looked at them in wonder. ‘So… this is what a family is supposed to look like…” Sure, he had always had his grandfather as family, but that was hardly what most would consider to be a normal family, though he was aware that family wasn’t necessarily just being related by blood or anything like that. But regardless, this was more peaceful than anything when his mother was around, and simply more people and a whole lot louder than when it was just him and his grandfather.

Otabek had been noticing this entire time how Yuri always seemed so amazed at everything that transpired in the household. Like he had never been around people and seen them actually get along with each other. Though Otabek was aware that Yuri had never had more of a family than just his grandfather, he had thought that Yuri wouldn’t be surprised to see how a normal family functioned. But then again, Otabek didn’t really know whether his family was normal or not. Either way, Otabek couldn’t help but feel sorry for Yuri, though he would never tell Yuri that unless he had a death wish. Family had always been a very important part of his life, and for Yuri, his grandfather had always been very important to him but he had never really had more of a family than that, and his other family members only had negative influences on Yuri. And Otabek decided that he wanted to show Yuri what it’s like to be in a family, and show him why it’s so important. 

Somehow, Madina did end up making a comeback, and to Damir’s dismay, the game ended up continuing for another hour and a half. “Seriously, this game goes on forever,” Damir said with a sigh. 

“You know, you could’ve just been super wasteful with your money until you were bankrupt, and then you could’ve stopped playing,” Yuri pointed out. 

“Well, it’s an interesting game at least,” Damir said, refusing to acknowledge what Yuri had said. “But, since I persevered and got all the way through it, I get to decide what we watch next.” 

“Oh no,” Otabek, Madina, and Alina groaned simultaneously. 

“Why ‘oh no’?” Yuri questioned. 

“Every year Dad inevitably forces us to have a Christmas movie marathon. We had all been hoping that with your arrival, he would be too distracted to remember to force us into it, but it appears that we were wrong,” Otabek explained, and so they all went over to the couch and watched whatever odd Christmas movie Damir chose until none of them could stay awake for another second.

  
  


“Fuck I probably should’ve asked this before, but do you celebrate Christmas religiously?” Yuri asked on Christmas Eve. 

“No, it’s honestly just a time to be with family, eat good food, and give each other gifts. Christmas isn’t really a holiday in Kazakhstan, since there are very few Christian people. We didn’t even celebrate it for a while, we only started after I told my family what I did for Christmas each year in the various places that I was training, and they thought that it sounded like fun, so here we are. Why? Do you want to go to church, because if so there’s a couple of churches nearby that are probably holding services,” Otabek said. 

“Oh thank goodness. Sorry, I’m not religious at all and I never have been, so I was worried that your family might be super religious and then it’d just be awkward, it just didn’t hit me that Christmas is a primarily religious holiday until just a little bit ago and I realized that I hadn’t asked.” 

“Oh, okay cool.” 

“So, what does your family do for Christmas then?”

“We all help out with cooking a really large meal which we eat around 2, and then afterwards we all give each other gifts and that’s about it. What did you do for Christmas back in Russia?” 

“Grandfather and I would make more pirozhkis than should probably ever be in a place at once a few days before Christmas to be eaten with Christmas dinner. We would have more than pirozhkis, though. We eat some foods that are more traditional to eat at christmas as well, like a soup called borscht, and this sweet drink called vzvar. For a while we didn’t exchange presents but after I started competing we did, though it didn’t hit me then that the reason we didn’t give gifts was that we didn’t have enough money to do so until my skating started paying for itself, and after awhile it helped generate some income for us. And by the end of all that, we were both exhausted and would go to sleep early,” Yuri said, sounding quite nostalgic, though not exactly sad. 

“That sounds really nice,” Otabek said, making a mental note to get ingredients for pirozhkis later so that they could be added to the meal. 

“Oh shit. I’m such an idiot,” Yuri said, doing a complete turn from his previously contemplative and reminiscent state. 

“What’s wrong?” 

“I meant to get everyone in your family gifts at some point after I had gotten to know them a little bit, but it’s a day before Christmas and I still haven’t managed to get them anything!” 

“Do you know what to get them now?” 

“Sort of? I still don’t know them very well but I think that I can manage.” 

“Come on, we can go right now!” 

“Will shops even be open? It is Christmas Eve after all.” 

“Oh, yeah they will be. Christmas isn’t a very big deal here, so most places are open on Christmas day, and everywhere is open on Christmas Eve!” 

“Awesome,” Yuri said and they went out into Almaty. “What do you think your mom would like?”

“Why don’t you try to figure something out first, and then I’ll help you.” 

“Fine,” Yuri huffed before going from shop to shop. “Does it get very cold here?” 

“Yuri, it’s snowing right now,” Otabek deadpans. 

“Yeah but it’s not cold.”

“It’s only five degrees, that’s cold.” 

“Not to me.” 

“You’re too Russian. Anyways, why do you ask?” 

“Oh,” Yuri says and leads Otabek to a pair of brightly colored mittens in the store that they were in, “I was thinking about getting those for your mother.” 

“Those are good! See, you could do it without my help!” 

“Come on, I saw a tech shop down the street and I think I’ll be able to find something for your sister there.”

“You need to pay for those first!” 

“Oh, fuck, you’re right,” Yuri said as he went up to the counter to check out before making his way over to the technology shop.

The tech store was the most crowded place in the entire world. “Why won’t people move, god damn it,” Yuri complained to Otabek. 

“Language Yura,” Otabek chided, though in a joking manner. 

“Oh shut the fuck up, I’ll swear if I want to,” Yuri replied lightly.

After a while of trying to shove past people just to be able to browse at accessories, Otabek suggested that they try somewhere else, and Yuri full heartedly agreed, so they made their way over to a bookstore. 

“Does your sister really like reading? She seems more like the type to be on her phone all day,” Yuri said. 

“Looks can be deceiving. She loves being on her phone, yes, but she also loves absorbing herself in books. The only reason you haven’t realized this yet is because she refuses to read when other people are around, preferring to read in her bedroom instead. Apparently being out of her room is too distracting and just ‘ruins the beautiful worlds that the authors worked so hard to create!’” 

“So what genre does she like? This bookstore is huge, at least give me something to narrow down our choices!” 

“Guess. But I’ll give you a hint, once again, looks are deceiving.”

“Okay well I was going to guess romance, because she honestly seems like the person to like that sort of crap, but since you said that, I’m going to go with historical fiction.” 

“Good job. Historical fiction and fantasy are tied for her favorite, though last time I checked, romance is a close second.” 

In the end, they go with a book called, ‘Carry On,’ because Otabek mentioned that his sister was the one to get him to love the Harry Potter series, and this book seemed to have a similar writing style and plot line, while still being different enough to be interesting. Then, the only person left to shop for was Damir. 

“I know!” Yuri shouted and dashed to a store across the street. 

“Oh no. I don’t like where this is going,” Otabek said, seeing that the store they had walked into was a movie store. 

“Well, it sounded like you all watch the same christmas movies each year, so maybe it would be good for your dad to have some new movies to choose from.” 

“Don’t encourage him!” 

“Well at least you would be able to watch some movies that you hadn’t watched before. Plus everything is half off today so I can get him even more movies. Look, they have Frozen!” 

“Is Frozen really a Christmas movie?” 

“It has snow. It counts.” 

“Whatever you say.”

They end up getting Frozen along with four more movies with varying levels of relevance to Christmas. As they left the shop to go back to Otabek’s house, Yuri turned to him and said, “Thanks for your help, Beka. I’ve never had to shop for so many people!” 

“Of course Yura. Now let’s go home and get some hot chocolate. Even if your strange Russian body doesn’t think that it’s cold, I think that it’s freezing and I need some hot chocolate as soon as possible.” 

  
  


“Wait, are you making pirozhkis?” Yuri questioned when he saw all the ingredients for them laid out on a section of the counter amidst the crowded kitchen on Christmas morning. 

“So this is how you greet me? No ‘Merry Christmas’ but instead inquiring about what food I’m making!” Otabek replied happily. 

“Are. You. Making. Pirozhkis.” 

“So what if I am?” 

“I’ll take that as a yes. And you don’t have to make pirozhkis for me.” 

“Well, it seemed to be a part of Christmas that you really enjoyed, so why not have it here as well?” 

“You’re way too thoughtful.” 

“Why do you say that like it’s a bad thing.” 

“I don’t know,” Yuri said, looking resigned. In all honesty, he thought it was a bad thing because he didn’t think he deserved all the kindness that Otabek had showed him. But it was Christmas, no need to ruin the happy mood with his insecurities. “Here, can I at least help you make them?” 

“Why of course,” Otabek said and the conversation dwindled away as they became absorbed in making the delicious food. 

Everything they had for their Christmas dinner was delicious, and soon they had all eaten more than they should’ve allowed themselves to, and they congregated on the couch, presents strewn across the floor. 

They went around in a circle opening up presents from one another, and Yuri was pleasantly surprised that Otabek’s family members had gotten him presents, though he supposed that he had bought them gifts as well. So far, he had gotten a sweatshirt with cat ears on the hood from Madina, and a lot of sweets from Alina, and he was now opening up his present from Otabek. 

“What,” Yuri said, his mouth dropping when he saw the wrapping paper’s contents. 

“Do you like them?” Otabek asked nervously. 

“I love them! I’ve wanted these for so long but I only saw them in the window of that store, and it was closed so I couldn’t get them! I had been seriously considering breaking in, but unfortunately, you dragged me away before I got the opportunity. Thank you so much!” Yuri exclaimed. 

“You’re welcome,” Otabek said, looking a little smug. After he had seen Yuri’s eyes light up at the sight of the tiger print covered ice skates, he knew that he had to get them for Yuri, and had found them online a while later. Though a lot had changed since their first Grand Prix Final, one thing that had never changed, and probably wasn’t ever going to, was Yuri’s profound love of cats and any item that had tiger print, or anything similar. 

“Now you should open my gift!” Yuri said excitedly, and Otabek noticed that there was a dangerous glint in his eyes, one that left him uncertain over whether this was going to end well or not. 

“Where is it?” 

“Let me go and get it,” Yuri ran off to another part of the house and dragged in a box that Yuri himself could probably fit inside. 

“What is that,” Otabek said, confused.

“Just open it,” Yuri snaps, so Otabek does, unwrapping a box, and opening it, only to find. Another box. 

“I swear to god Yuri, if this is just a series of boxes and there’s just a prank gift inside or anything like that…” Otabek said, now coming to realize why Yuri’s eyes had glinted so dangerously. 

“You’ll see…” Yuri said mysteriously. 

In the end everybody wound up helping Otabek disassemble the intense series of wrapped box within wrapped box. Every time they got to one, Otabek thought, ‘This is the one, this is the one that will have a gift in it.’ But it never was, until at last there was just a box that could fit in the palm of Otabek’s hand, and by the way that Yuri was smiling, Otabek knew that this one contained the present. 

He unwrapped it, and inside that box he found a pair of soft leather gloves. “I noticed that your gloves were getting pretty worn out, so I got you a new pair. I hope that they fit!” Yuri explained. 

Otabe slipped them on. They were ridiculously comfortable, and as Otabek was admiring them, he noticed that there was something embroidered on the edge of his right glove. It was stitched so small that it took him a moment to realize that it was actually words embroidered instead of just a pattern. Once he realized that it said something, however, he started reading and realized that it read, ‘To love, whatever your definition of that may be.’

“Thank you so much Yura,” Otabek said softly, shocked at what a thoughtful present Yuri had given him. 

“You’re welcome Beka,” Yuri responded, and they continued to give each other gifts.


	10. Chapter 10

“I’m retiring,” Yuri told Otabek over the phone flatly. It had been a few years since that wonderful christmas, and he and Otabek were still incredibly close. 

“Wait what?” Otabek responded. 

“Oh don’t sound so surprised, you retired last year!” 

“Yeah, but I was 27 when I retired, you’re only 25 right now, you still have a couple of years before your body should be forcing you to retire. Is there some other reason that you’re retiring?” 

“It’s forcing me to retire now. Maybe it wouldn’t be if I hadn’t ignored pulled muscles and crap when I was younger, but whenever I injured myself I would just push through it, and often try to train even harder, and it seems like all that idiocy has caught up to me. My body just isn’t what it used to be.” 

“What’re you going to do now? Coach?” 

“Coaching sounds like hell, I have no clue how you do it. I don’t know how you can be patient enough to teach. Besides, I’d probably scare the kids even more than Yakov scared the Russian skaters.” 

“Well, somebody’s got to try and get more people to skate in Kazakhstan!” 

“Is it worth it?” 

“Yes, I actually enjoy it a lot! So what is it that you’re going to do?”

“I’m going to judge.”

“Really?” 

“Yeah, the ISU offered to let me start judging as soon as I retired, and so I think that I’m going to take that offer.” 

“Okay, you’d be good at that.” 

“Wow thanks.” 

“It’s supposed to be a compliment!”

“Sure. Well, I just thought I should let you know before I have to tell the goddamn press tomorrow. Wish me luck.” 

“Good luck!” 

And so, Yuri became a judge at skating competitions across the world. It was amazing. He got payed to be judgemental and hyper critical, and he got payed to travel across the world. However, it was quite lonely, for skating competitions were separated by long expanses of free time and boredom, especially during the off season. 

Two years after Yuri started his new job, he and Otabek were skyping, and he noticed something. Otabek looked nervous. This wasn’t normal. Sure, it used to be normal, especially when they were first becoming friends, but it certainly wasn’t normal anymore. Why was Otabek nervous? “Otabek, is something wrong? You look kind of nervous,” Yuri asked. 

“I’m not nervous,” Otabek said, a little too quickly, making Yuri suspicious.

“What’s going on.”

“I’m sorry, I just have a question for you and I don’t know whether I should ask it or not.” 

“Well, what’s the question.” 

“But I still don’t know whether I should ask or not.” 

“If you don’t tell me now I’ll make sure that you tell me later because now I’m way too curious to be able to let this go.” 

“Okay. Have you ever heard of a qpr?” 

“No.” 

“Well, it’s an acronym for quasi-platonic-relationship.” 

“What does that mean?”

“It’s like being in a relationship, except everything’s completely platonic.” 

“Oh, cool. So, what about it.” 

Otabek remained silent for a moment, not knowing quite how to ask this, and still not knowing if he even should, but he continued nonetheless. It was too late to try and turn back now. “Would you like to be in a qpr with me?” 

Yuri’s face broke into a smile, “Of course. On one condition.” 

“What’s the condition,” Otabek responded. 

Yuri had been trying to figure out how to ask this for a while now, and Otabek had just set him up perfectly, so he said, “My condition is that we move in together.” 

“Huh?” Otabek said, surprised.

“I mean, if you don’t want to, that’s okay, we don’t have to move in together!” Yuri said quickly, now regretting his impulsiveness.. 

“No, no, I’d like that. As long as you’re the one moving, not me. I have too many students here to be able to leave.” 

“Okay! Yeah of course. When should I move in?” 

“As soon as you can work out immigration stuff?” 

“Sounds good!”  

  
  


It was a year and a half later when Yuri had gotten everything ready for him to immigrate to Kazakhstan, and he still couldn’t believe that he was about to do this. It had been well over a year since they had decided to be in a qpr. A year and a half since they decided to move in together. Yuri still couldn’t believe that he had been the one to suggest the latter. Usually, Yuri wasn’t that impulsive, but the words had just slipped out of his mouth without his brain processing it. 

And honestly, even though Yuri denied it, he was scared. He and Otabek had grown really close over the years and Yuri was scared that living with him would somehow screw everything up. Yuri was scared that if Otabek had to spend that much time with him, he would eventually realize how terrible a person Yuri is and would leave him. He was scared because this was such unfamiliar territory. Once he had started skating, everything, besides his mother leaving, had been pretty constant. Switching from competing to judging had definitely mixed things up, but his life still revolved around skating and he still lived in the same place, keeping things relatively similar. But now he was moving, and to an entirely different country. 

As Yuri boarded the plane to Kazakhstan, he willed the voices in his head to stop filling him with fear, but it had no effect. On the contrary, it felt like the higher the plane rose in the air, the more negative the thoughts grew to be. Worst case scenarios were playing in his mind on a constant loop, showing how Otabek would have enough of Yuri’s annoyingness and leave him, because that’s what was inevitable in life. Others leaving you. By the time Yuri had landed in Kazakhstan, he had half a mind to try and get the next flight back to St. Petersburg, to simply run away from his problems and fears. However, he went through customs and to the baggage claim nonetheless, and as he got his suitcase, a voice called out behind him, saying, “Yuri! You’re here!” 

“Hey Beka,” Yuri said awkwardly, surprised by how excited Otabek had sounded. 

“How was the flight?” Otabek asked. 

“It was fine,” Yuri said untruthfully. 

“No it wasn’t Yuri, I can tell that you’re scowling. What happened,” Otabek said after seeing Yuri’s apprehensive and exhausted looking face. 

“I’m not scowling,” Yuri said, deciding that it would end best if he didn’t explain. “Come on, let’s go.”

“Okay, yeah, let’s go,” Otabek said in agreement, probably figuring that it wasn’t a battle worth fighting. 

They soon arrived at Otabek’s apartment in downtown Almaty. It was quite different than the Altin family’s home that he had visited last time he was in Kazakhstan. Instead of the casual mess that was strewn across the house, his apartment was ridiculously clean, almost to an extent of being intimidating. The house felt cramped but in a cozy and sweet kind of way, whereas the apartment was extremely spacious for being in downtown Almaty, with a spare bedroom already set up for Yuri and a lot less clutter covering every square inch of the house. However there were some similarities between the two places. Both had many family photos mounted on the walls, both had many bright colors popping up randomly. As well as that, both places had a friendly, gentle, and calming ambience.

Yuri started to unpack what he had brought, though there was more which he hadn’t brought in a suitcase, but had rather opted to mail from St Petersburg to Almaty. He only had his clothes, and his cat with him currently. Many more things would be coming later, like his collection of books and movies, and a couple of family heirlooms that Yuri prayed would arrive without breaking. But for now, Yuri decided that his top priority was his cat. Hos cat who was desperate to get out of her cage, meowing incessantly. “Can I let Monetka out?” Yuri asked Otabek. 

“Of course! Oh she’s so pretty,” Otabek said, admiring the silky gray and white cat. Of course, he had seen her before in photos, but she was so much more beautiful and regal looking in person. 

“She likes you,” Yuri remarked as Monetka rubbed against Otabek’s legs, and then hopped into Otabek’s lap, purring contentedly.  

“Can I pick her up?” 

“If you have a death wish, sure, but if you don’t, it’s not advised. But don’t worry, she can be very cuddly when she chooses to be and will sit on your lap for ages. Oh, and sometimes when you’re laying down she’ll start rubbing her face against your face and it’s the sweetest thing in the world. Although other times, she tends to forget that humans are a thing that exist, and will ignore you completely.” 

“Hmm. She’s amazing!” 

“Yeah, she is. I should go finish unpacking!” Yuri said before going off into his room. He had finally started to feel like everything was going to go alright, I mean, Otabek approved of his cat. However, as soon as Yuri got some solitude, his thoughts returned, reminding him of how he was actually going to be living with Otabek. Sure, they had lived together before, but always for brief periods of time. This. This was indefinite, and Yuri had no clue how it would work. It was just so overwhelming. 

“Dinner’s ready!” Otabek called, interrupting Yuri from his thoughts and unpacking a while later..

“Thank you!” Yuri said and joined Otabek at the table. 

“Hey Yura, are you sure that you’re alright, you’re scowling again, did something happen?” Otabek asked. 

“I’m fine, and nothing happened,” Yuri said, not wanting to admit to Otabek how anxious he was about the whole ordeal. 

“Are you sure? Please, if something happened, tell me,” Otabek said. He was aware that he was probably pushing Yuri a little bit more than Yuri was used to, and that that might end in Yuri snapping, or completely shutting him out, but something was clearly wrong, and Otabek thought that it would be best if he actually knew what was going on so that he could do something about it.

“It’s not a big deal,” Yuri tried. He was aware that it wouldn’t necessarily end poorly if he talked to Otabek about it, but he was still determined not to, because it was honestly a quite awkward thing to admit. 

“If it’s not a big deal, then you can tell me,” Otabek countered, smiling slightly when he saw the look of dangerous determination painted on Yuri’s face melt into something a little softer, though also, for some reason, a little bit afraid looking. 

“Ugh, fine. I’m just anxious, that’s all,” Yuri said, trying not to yell at himself for being as stupid as to tell Otabek this. 

“Why are you anxious,” Otabek pushed, though he had a pretty good idea of why he was anxious. They were moving in together, after all. 

“I’m, I’m anxious because since we’re living together, you’ll inevitably spend a lot of time with me and once you spend that much time with me, you’ll realize how terrible of a person I am, and that you don't want to be around me anymore, and then you’ll leave me. I don’t want you to leave,” Yuri admitted hurriedly, knowing that Otabek could read his emotions better than anybody, and in the end it would be easier just to tell Otabek what had been going on inside of his mind instead of trying to lie. 

Otabek smiled sadly at Yuri from across the table, and softly said, “You have nothing to worry about. I’m not going to leave you. You mean too much to me for me to be able to leave you, okay?” 

“Okay,” Yuri said, his mind just a little more at ease.  


	11. Chapter 11

It had been two months since Yuri had moved in with Otabek. It had also been two months since Yuri had posted a photo on instagram. He knew that if he did, Viktor and Yuuri would inevitably see it, and figure out that he wasn’t living in Russia anymore, and then freak out and be insufferable, annoying messes. Viktor and Yuuri were now splitting their time between Japan and Russia, and though they tried to get Yuri to come to their place while they were in St. Petersburg, Yuri always refused, and so far Viktor and Yuuri hadn’t thought anything of it. Yuri had wanted to avoid having to deal with Viktor and Yuuri finding out, but one day, he just couldn’t resist posting a photo. 

Monetka was curled up in a chair, bathing in the sunlight, completely surrounded by Otabek’s surprisingly large stuffed animal collection that lived on said chair. It was just too precious of a sight to not post it to instagram. 

He realized an hour later that this was a terrible mistake. His phone buzzed, he had gotten a text from Viktor that read, “Where are you right now. That’s not your place in St. Petersburg.” 

“Why do you care,” Yuri texted back. 

“How long have you been in this place. Where is it. Are you living there now? Are you living with somebody else? I haven’t seen you much since your retirement. Are you even still in Russia?” Viktor replied almost a second after Yuri’s response, the questions coming so fast that Yuri decided that it shouldn't be humanly possible for fingers to move so quickly.

“Ugh I don’t want to deal with this, you idiot,” Yuri replied, quickly tiring of Viktor’s enthusiastic questioning. 

“Okay so I’ll take it that you are living with somebody else. Who are you living with????” Viktor replied, and Yuri tossed his phone across the room, deciding that he did not have the time, the patience, or the energy to deal with this shit. 

Yuri went out into the kitchen to find Otabek making dinner. “Is something wrong Yura?” Otabek asked when he saw Yuri’s dark scowl. 

“Nothing’s wrong,” Yuri said quickly. 

“You say that a lot, but it’s never true. So what is it that’s happening?” 

“I was an idiot and posted a picture on instagram because Monetka was being too adorable.” 

“So?” 

“So, Viktor saw and now he’s being an ass.” 

“You mean he’s overly curious?” 

“Yes, exactly! And I know that if I told him that I was living with you in Kazakhstan he’d take it completely the wrong way and it’d be so goddamn annoying so I was trying to avoid the situation by not posting anything on instagram and just refusing to hang out with him and Yuuri when they’re in St Petersburg, but I couldn’t resist taking a photo any longer. Monetka was lying in the middle of your stuffed animal pile and it was just too perfect to not post! And now Viktor will not stop bugging me about it and I just don’t want to have deal with it right now, or ever.” 

“You realize that you could just tell him the truth, right?” 

“But what if he thinks that I’m lying or some shit like that.” 

“You know that he wouldn’t do that. I don’t know much about Viktor, but from what you’ve told me, everything would be a whole lot simpler and a whole lot less dramatic if you just explained it to him instead of avoiding it. He has a flare for the dramatics, as far as I can tell, and if he shows up here in a few days just because you didn’t want to explain everything to him, it’s your own fault and I won’t allow you to complain about it if it does happen.” 

“Ugh, fine, I’ll text him after supper,” Yuri said as they started to eat, but by the time they finished their meal, Yuri had long forgotten that he said that, and since Viktor didn’t text him with any more questions, he didn’t send Viktor his explanation.

Soon enough, it was two am, and a knocking noise rung through the quiet apartment and woke Otabek up. He went over to Yuri’s room and shook him awake. saying, “Yuri, somebody just knocked on our door.” 

“I’ll go grab my knife shoes,” Yuri responded groggily, yawning. 

“We should at least check who it is before we go to violent measures.” 

“Fuck, I know who it is.” 

“What is it? Who is it?” 

“I, I forgot to text Viktor earlier, it just slipped my mind! I bet it’s him. That idiot must’ve gotten on the first plane out of St. Petersburg to Almaty. I’m definitely going to go get  my knife shoes.” 

“I’ll go let him in. Ugh, it’s way too late for this,” Otabek responded, walking over to the entrance and opening it to, unsurprisingly, see Viktor. 

“You don’t even look shocked to see me here!” Viktor whined when he saw Otabek’s blank expression. 

“What the fuck are you doing here!” Yuri yelled, wielding his ice skates like they were weapons. 

“Ah, so I was right, Yuri is living here,” Viktor said, amused. 

“How much money do you fucking have? You seriously just flew over here just because you were curious as to where I lived????” Yuri yelled, his exhaustion making him even more temperamental.

“Of course! I was curious, nd I had a suspicion that I would find you here, so here we are” Viktor said, smirking. 

“How did you know where I live?” Otabek questioned, completely perplexed. It’s not like he and Viktor were friends.

“I have my sources. And now, since Yuri was so rude to me earlier, would you mind explaining to me how it got to be that you two are living together,” Viktor said, his eyes glimmering with curiosity. 

“We’re living together because we wanted to,” Yuri snapped. 

“I already got that, so do you care to elaborate? Are you two, in a relationship perhaps?” Viktor said. 

“Yes,” Otabek said at the exact same time that Yuri said, “No.” 

“Hmm, now that’s an interesting reaction, I’m going to go with Otabek’s answer, because honestly, Yuri, you’re not very trustworthy. So, how long have you two been dating?” Viktor asked. 

Otabek could tell how angry Yuri was at this insinuation, and, deciding that it would be best if Yuri didn’t talk, for fear of the invectives that would come out of his mouth, Otabek said, “Yes, we’re in a relationship, but not in the way that you would probably define one.”

“Well, what does that mean?” Viktor questioned, looking confused and curious. 

“We’re both ace and aro as fuck,” Yuri said before Otabek could answer in a calmer fashion. 

“And what does that mean?” Viktor said, wanting Otabek and Yuri to just get to the point and explain what was going on already.

“Ace is short for asexual, which means having no sexual attraction to anybody, and aro is shot for aromantic, which means having no romantic attraction to anybody. So, we’re in a relationship, a qpr, or a quasi platonic relationship. It’s like dating, except without any sexual or romantic feelings involved.” 

“Oh!” Viktor said, his eyes lighting up in understanding, then saying, “You know, Yuri, you could’ve just explained that to me over text. Then I wouldn’t have had to fly all the way over here.” 

“I didn’t ask you to show up at my door at two fucking am. That is all on you,” Yuri said coldly. 

“But I was curious,” Viktor whined. 

“Well it’s two am, so we should all sleep. Viktor, if you want you can sleep on the couch,” Otabek offered.

“You’re inviting him to stay here???? You’re way too polite and kind, Beka,” Yuri said before retreating to his room. 

The next morning at breakfast Viktor said, “Yuri I’m so proud of you for figuring out your identity! Remember all those years ago, I think you were only 16 back then, and Yuuri and I tried to help you and you were so confused!”

“And you two were absolutely no help,” Yuri retorted, and, after seeing Viktor start to pout, he grabbed Viktor and shoved him out of the apartment, slamming the door in his face and saying, “Goodbye.”

“What was that for?” Otabek asked. 

“He showed up at two am just to see where I was living, and you were polite enough to give him the couch??? He does not get the luxury of finishing breakfast,” Yuri answered.


	12. Chapter 12

Over time, Otabek noticed different things about Yuri more and more. Otabek had always had an eye for detail, but living with Yuri and talking with him every day certainly helped Otabek to notice more things. Some things that Otabek noticed were positive. Like how Yuri texted Yuuri, Viktor, and Mila a lot, but if he was ever asked about remaining in touch with them, he would adamantly deny it. Or how Yuri was very thoughtful and made an effort to get to know all of Otabek’s students, and occasionally come in to teach students basic ballet, something that was not within Otabek’s skill set. 

However, Otabek also noticed negative things, like how whenever Otabek talked about his childhood in relation to his family, Yuri always looked painfully wistful. How Yuri would drop brief mentions of his life with his mother, but nothing more. How bitter Yuri looked whenever the subject was brought up, but how firmly he reassured Otabek that it was fine, and that he was over it. Yuri was definitely not fine with what had happened, and was not over it. He obviously had some stuff in his past which he had not yet managed to make peace with, and it always seemed like Yuri needed to talk through some of the stuff that had happened, but just wasn’t willing to start opening up about it quite yet. 

Otabek knew that Yuri wouldn’t be keen to talk to Otabek about what had happened any more than he had in the past. Yuri was the type to worry far too much about others, more concerned that telling Otabek would be upsetting for Otabek than thinking about how it might benefit him. So, if Yuri wasn’t going to talk to Otabek but still seemed to need to talk about it, maybe it would be good to talk to somebody who was trained to handle these types of situations. Maybe it would be good for Yuri to consider seeing a therapist. 

At breakfast the next day, Otabek decided to suggest this to Yuri, saying, “Hey, Yuri, I have a suggestion for you.” 

“Yeah, what is it,” Yuri responded, grabbing cereal from the cupboards. 

“Well, I know you don’t want to talk to me about your past, but maybe it might be good for you to consider seeing a therapist?” Otabek suggested. 

Yuri’s face flashed through a thousand different emotions at once, all of which Otabek wasn’t able to read. However, his facial expression settled on something that was all too often on Yuri’s face, before Yuri responded, “What. Do you think I’m weak? Do you think I can’t handle this? I’ve handled it without a therapist this far, I don’t need to see one now. I’m not some wounded puppy. I’m not some weakling that needs to be helped. I can fucking do this. I always have in the past, and I can continue to do so now. How fucking stupid are you? You don’t know me and you don’t know what’s best for me!! I know that you think that you do. I know that you think that you know me really well, and I admit, you do, especially compared to most. However, you do not know what I need, and you don’t know what’s best for me! You haven’t lived through my life, so you can’t know what I’ve gone through or whether I need some fucking therapist or not. I don’t need a therapist! It’s not like it would help me anyways, it would probably just manage to make things worse! I don’t need someone trying to dissect my brain and my past, looking into my problems like I’m something broken down, in need of repair. I don’t need a therapist to tell me things that I already know, and I don’t need another person to treat me like a goddamn child!  I’m not weak, okay! I can do this, just like I always have, stop being idiotic, okay?” 

Otabek had not been expecting that to be Yuri’s reaction. He expected that Yuri might take a while to warm up to the idea of therapy, might take some convincing, some time. But Otabek had not expected Yuri to explode. Of course, Otabek had been the witness of many of Yuri’s bouts of anger. However, that anger was almost always directed at somebody else. Otabek knew how to deal with that. He knew how to calm Yuri down, how to rationalize Yuri’s thoughts until the anger ebbed away. But Otabek did not know how to deal with Yuri’s anger being directed at him. Sure, they had gotten into their fair share of squabbles, but it was never anything serious. Not anything to worry about. However, this was the angriest Otabek had seen Yuri get in a long time, and it was by far the angriest Yuri had ever been with Otabek. And Otabek just didn’t know what to do. 

Growing up in a family that liked to steer clear of conflicts, and work things out in as rational a way as possible, which never included angrily ranting out frustrations, had a lot of pros. It meant that Otabek was generally good at working through fights with other people as long as both of them were calm, and willing to talk through it. However, neither of these things seemed to apply to Yuri right now. The main con of coming from such a peaceful family was that Otabek did not know how to deal with anger. Growing up, he didn’t have any experiences with anger or shouting or rude things being directed in his way, so he had no skills on how to handle it. Since Otabek didn’t know how to handle Yuri’s anger, he simply didn’t. After Yuri waited a few moments to see if Otabek would reply, he grabbed his cereal and stormed to his bedroom. 

Once Yuri got to his bedroom, it hit him. This was he and Otabek’s first real fight. Sure, they had had plenty of fights in the past, but those hadn’t meant anything. This one meant something. Yuri had never intended to direct his anger at Otabek. With most people, Yuri had no problems with being angry. This was because most people were acclimated to his temper, and dismissed it easily, knowing that Yuri would calm down by the next day, and that they shouldn’t take it too seriously. Otabek, however, was a difficult person to get angry at, so it hadn’t really happened before. This meant that Otabek, especially by the way that he had froze at Yuri’s words rather than retaliate or try to work through the situation, had taken it personally, and probably wasn’t going to dismiss this. 

However, Yuri was slightly pleased about that last statement. Yuri didn’t want Otabek to dismiss this. Yuri was still quite angry, and he felt like this was justified. Yuri didn’t need a therapist, and Otabek suggesting that he did was, honestly, quite insulting. If nothing else, Yuri’s experiences had made him stronger, not weaker, and he did not need to see a therapist. Sure, his early childhood had been a bit fucked up, but that didn’t mean that he needed everybody else’s pity, or that he needed to talk with someone about what had happened. Otabek didn’t need to suggest that Yuri needed a therapist, and Otabek didn’t need to act like he knew what was best for Yuri all the time. Yuri didn’t need anybody else’s help to get through things, he was perfectly fine on his own, and he did not need anybody telling him otherwise. 

By the time that afternoon had come, Yuri had only come out of his room once to get some lunch. However, it was then that Yuri realized that he couldn’t just ignore dealing with this problem while drowning himself in anger. This wasn’t like most of his fights, where everybody involved would just pretend that it hadn’t happened and there wouldn’t be any solution to the problem. No, this was a fight with somebody that he lived with. Somebody that he cared about. Somebody that he loved. There couldn’t just be conflict in this fight, there had to be resolution as well.

Yuri pulled out his phone and texted Mila, “I fucked up,” knowing that she would reply quickly, and most likely have decent advice. Though he might deny it, Yuri had kept quite close contact with Mila over the years, as well as with Viktor and Yuuri, and he knew that he could always count on Mila to be the annoying older sister with surprisingly reasonable advice that he never had. 

“Oh no, what did you do this time Yuri?” Mila texted back a few minutes later. 

Yuri didn’t quite know how to explain what had happened, but responded nonetheless, saying, “Otabek and I got into a fight. Like, a real one, not one that’s unimportant and insignificant or anything, but a real one.”

“What were you fighting about?” Mila asked. 

“He suggested that I go to therapy because of things that happened in my past,” Yuri texted awkwardly, trying to get the point across without actually mentioning what had happened. Mila was among the many people that knew for some reason or another, Yuri was raised by his grandfather, but never knew why. Otabek was the only person who knew the actual reason. “And I exploded. I’m not some weak idiot who needs help! I’ve made it this far without others, I don’t need people’s help now! It’s just like what used to happen with Yuri’s Angels. They would always assume that I was some weak, helpless child who wasn’t capable of doing one goddamn thing. But I’m not. I don’t need anybody else’s help! Besides, he’s always acting like he knows what’s best for me, and he doesn’t!”

It took a while for Mila to respond, and when she did, the text read, “Oh Yuri, you really are an idiot sometimes, aren’t you?” 

“What do you mean?” Yuri responded, almost adding ‘you hag’ at the end out of habit but then thinking that now probably wasn’t the best time for him to project all his anger onto others. 

“You’re being stupid. It’s obvious that Otabek is just trying to help. He’s just concerned about you, and probably wants you to talk through whatever happened in your past, because he cares about you. It’s not a bad thing for somebody to care about you, Yuri. You’re just assuming that he meant it as an insult because you’ve had some negative experiences with your fans treating you like a child before. So, you’re mistaking Otabek trying to show that he cares about you, and that he wants you to be able to work through whatever happened in the past in a healthy manner, for him insulting you and treating you like a child. Also, are you sure that you’re not mad just because you’re uncomfortable with people caring about you, and showing that they care about you? That was besides the point. Anyways, Otabek is just trying to help. He isn’t trying to say that you need to be helped, he isn’t trying to say that you’re weak. Going to therapy doesn’t mean that you’re weak. Talking through things doesn’t make you weak. And just because you’ve made it this far without other people helping you doesn’t mean that you need to go on without other people helping you, or that you should. It’s okay to be helped, it doesn’t make you weak. Otabek isn’t trying to say that you can’t do this on your own. Fucking hell, Yuri, he isn’t even trying to say that you need to go to therapy. From all I can tell, he was just trying to see if therapy would be something that you would consider trying out! He wasn’t trying to suggest that he knew what was best for you, he was just trying to make a suggestion that he thought might end up helping you!”

It took Yuri a while to process what Mila had told him, pointing out all the things that his anger had prevented him from see. Said anger quickly receded at the newfound perspective he had gained, and it quickly transformed into guilt. Yuri then replied to Mila, saying, “Shit, I fucked up.” 

“Damn right you did, but you can fix it!” Mila texted back. 

“How? He probably doesn’t want to talk to me ever again, now that he’s seen how stupid, irrational, and hurtful my temper can be,” Yuri replied.

“I’m still your friend, and I’ve seen way worse than he has, since I’ve known you for much longer. And are you really this clueless? Just talk to him, apologize, work through it, okay? Go up to him and explain why you reacted in the way that you did, and that you now realize, thanks to your amazing friend Mila, that you were wrong and that you’re sorry, and ask for forgiveness. It’s not that hard, really,” Mila answered. Yuri could tell with almost certainty that Mila was shaking her head right now at what she perceived as Yuri being silly and stupid. 

“Okay, thanks, I’ll try,” Yuri responded, thanking the universe for letting him have a friend who could explain these things that others seemed to understand almost naturally. 

“Any time,” Mila said. 

Then, Yuri texted Otabek, figuring that he would like a heads up before Yuri tried to talk to him, saying, “Hey, can we talk?”

Otabek, for all that time, had been in a dizzying state of shock and confusion. He didn’t understand what had just happened, and he didn’t understand what rational way there was to go about the problem. He didn’t know how to work through something when the other person was clearly extremely angry. However, when Otabek received a text from Yuri asking if he wanted to talk, he obliged, replying with, “Okay, meet me in the kitchen.”

As soon as Yuri sat down next to Otabek at the kitchen table, he started ranting, “I’m so sorry Otabek, I’m so sorry! I’m such a goddamn idiot. I shouldn’t have gotten so angry with you and I shouldn’t have said all of those things. I’m sorry that I got so angry. It’s just that when you said that I assumed that you were suggesting that I couldn’t go on without help and that I was a weak idiot who couldn’t do something by myself and it reminded me a lot of Yuri’s Angels back when I was still competing, and then I got really angry. I know that you don’t think that you know what’s best for me, you just often have really kind and thoughtful suggestions and it’s easy to mistake them for you thinking that you know what’s best for me instead of you just caring about me. I’m not used to people showing that they care about me. I mean, I know that people care about me, they just don’t make it obvious, so I just don’t know how to respond when somebody makes it really obvious that they care about me, and I guess that my mind just went to it’s default of anger. Do you think you could forgive me?”

“It’s okay, I should’ve suggested it in a way that didn’t imply anything other than that I thought that it might be helpful. And of course I forgive you,” Otabek said, surprised by the sudden apology, yet relieved. “Oh, and in the future, we should try to avoid this.”

“What?” Yuri questioned. 

“When something bothers you, you get really angry and explode. My reaction to anger when it’s aimed at me is to implode. I just don’t do well with anger and become paralyzed in a sense, not doing anything about it. So, we should try to talk through our issues to begin with, instead of letting this happen again,” Otabek explained. 

“Okay, but only as long as you make sure to tell me if something bothers you. You tend to say nothing at all, which means that the problem doesn’t get fixed, which just doesn’t end well. We just need to make sure that we communicate with each other, and then we should be good!” Yuri added on. 

“Okay, sounds good!” Otabek said, relieved that the situation had resolved itself, and that now he and Yuri had a plan for how to handle things like these that might come up in the future. And, in the end, and after lots of time considering it, Yuri ended up taking Otabek’s advice and going to therapy, finding it to be quite helpful to actually talk through what had happened instead of desperately trying to ignore it. 


	13. Chapter 13

Life from then on was pretty peaceful for a while. Sure, Yuri had to travel constantly to different competitions, as did Otabek with his students who had chosen to go professional. However, the two of them fell into a sort of pattern. Many might think that it wouldn’t be so peaceful with Yuri’s short temper, however, after their first major fight, they both realized that they needed to work to communicate with each other, and work through the problem, leading to very few major conflicts.

However, despite the peace of their lives, they both had the same thing on their minds, though neither realized that the other had it on their mind. That is, until one day, Yuri decided that enough was enough and he just had to go out there and say it. 

“Hey Beka?” Yuri asked. 

“Yeah,” Otabek responded.

“Can we talk?” 

“Of course, what about?” 

“Okay this may seem sort of odd and out of the blue and maybe not what you’d be expecting to say and it’s completely okay if you don’t want to, I’d completely understand, but I was thinking, we’re both in our thirties, and have a stable enough life, so I was wondering if you might want to have kids at some point?” Yuri stuttered hesitantly. He couldn’t quite place the reason why he was so nervous about this. Probably because he wanted to have kids really badly and he was very afraid that Otabek wouldn’t want to have kids as well.

“I’m so glad you said that,” Otabek responded after he managed to process Yuri’s words. Otabek sounded shocked by Yuri’s suggestion, but he also sounded relieved. He too had been wanting to have kids for a while, but didn’t know how to bring the subject up. Though he knew Yuri impressively well at this point, he still couldn’t always read how Yuri felt about certain subjects and he had been afraid to bring the topic of having kids up, for fear that Yuri would hate the idea, and not even consider it. He wanted to have kids so badly that he hadn’t brought the idea up, for fear of it being rejected. 

“What? Why are you glad that I said that?”

“Because I’ve been thinking the exact same thing as well. I’ve always really wanted to have kids, to help them grow up and grow into who they are and help them with their passions and interests and give a kid what my parents gave me. Also, I’ve just always thought that being a parent would be really fun. I just didn’t think that you would want to have kids and that you would be kinda weirded out if I brought it up, so I didn’t. I don’t know why I thought that, though.” 

“Oh, really? Great! Yeah, I’ve just always wanted to watch a child grow up and help them along the way, and just be a supportive and positive role in their life. So many kids don’t get to have that and if I can change that my adopting a kid, well I want to,” Yuri said in a bittersweet tone, then promptly buried his face into a pillow and shouted, “Fuck that was so cheesy!” 

“Yura, if we’re going to have a kid, or kids, you can’t swear around them!” Otabek chastised. 

“Ugh. I know. But, it’ll be worth it, right?” 

“Right.” 

“Well, does adoption sound good?” 

“Yeah, it might take a while, but I think it’s the best option. Do you have a preference with age?” 

“Part of me would like to have a baby, but another part of me knows that the older you get, the less likely it is that you’ll be adopted, and kids who are no longer babies need homes as well. What about you?”

“No preference.” 

“Do you want multiple kids? Not necessarily right now, but at some point?” Yuri asked, though many more questions were running through his head. There was so much to consider with this. Of course, he had thought through all these things before, but it was odd actually talking through it with someone. Actually talking about it because it was something that was going to happen.

“Having two kids might be nice? Not having any siblings sounds a little lonely to me.” 

“Yeah, it is. Any preference about gender?” 

“No. The only reason people have preferences about gender is because they have strict gender stereotypes that are ingrained in their mind so they pick one or the other without realizing that a. All genders can do the same things, b. Gender isn’t binary, and c. you can’t actually choose your child’s gender.” 

“Well said. Thank you.” 

“Just so you know, Yura, it’s going to take a while. I don’t really know how our adoption system works here yet, but it’s probably not going to be great about us both being men, even if we’re not in a romantic relationship, they’ll assume that we are, seeing that we’re adopting a child together. Plus, the adoption process everywhere is ridiculously slow.”

“I know, I’ll try to be patient. And it will be worth it.” 

“Yes, it will.” 

  
  


“I hate this country, I hate the adoption process, I hate humanity, I hate the world, fuck I just hate everything goddamnit!” Yuri muttered. 

“Yura, calm down.” Otabek said gently. 

“How can I be calm? That woman took one look at us, and seeing that we were both men, laughed in our faces. She didn’t care whether we would be good parents, or whether we could provide for a child, and love and care for them unconditionally, or anything sensible like that. No! She just cared that we were both men and apparently that’s enough to make you unsuitable to care for children! I hate this entire fucking world!” 

“I know, Yura, I know. It’s frustrating. But getting worked up about it doesn’t do anything to help the situation. That woman isn’t worth your anger. Just try to forget about it. We’ll find an agency that will help us instead of turn us away. It might take as a little while but we’ll get there eventually, okay?” 

“Thanks, Beka.” 

And Otabek, as it turned out, was right. They found an agency five months later that was fine with them both being men, and was fine with Yuri being an immigrant. They had countless interviews to try and determine whether or not they would be good parents, and many checks of their apartment to make sure that it was suitable for kids, as well as checks over their financial state, which Yuri thought was unnecessary, for even though they didn’t make it obvious, they were pretty rich due to their combined skating careers and their current jobs. But thankfully, the process was about to be over. 

“I can’t believe that this is finally happening,” Yuri told Otabek excitedly. It was now two years after they had initially decided that they wanted to have kids. 

“Me neither,” Otabek said his voice filled with a quiet type of awe. 

“It said on the forms that you two might be interested in adopting siblings? Is that information still true?” A man from the adoption agency asked.

“Yeah, it’s still true,” Yuri responded. 

“Well, there’s two siblings who are currently waiting for a permanent home. Anara is eight months old, and her older brother, Serik, is three years old. I’ll warn you that Serik is quite energetic, and that Anara hasn’t yet started sleeping soundly throughout the night, but other than that, they appear to be lovely children,” the man told them. 

“Could we please meet them at some point?” Otabek asked. 

“Of course! We could also have you come back every couple of weeks to see whether you are all a good fit before you make the final decision about adopting,” the man said with a smile. 

“That sounds great, thank you so much!” Yuri said. 

So that’s what they did. Serik was quite shy when they first met him, though three year olds don’t often talk very much around strangers. However, throughout the meetings he got more and more at ease with Yuri and Otabek. And Anara was a perfect angel when she was with them, rarely crying, though she appeared to be very picky about food. 

One day, as Yuri and Otabek were driving back from one of their meetings, Otabek said, “I think we should do it.” 

“Do what?” Yuri asked.

“I think that we should adopt Anara and Serik.” 

“I think so too! Do you think that they’ll let us?” 

“There’ll be a bit more paperwork to fill out and other things like that, but besides that I think we’ll be good. That agency hasn’t so much as made a single complaint about us so far, I don’t think that they’ll try and stop us from adopting now.” 

One week later they adopted Anara and Serik. Though their lives were much more hectic now, neither of them minded, because they were a family. A loving, healthy family, and though Anara often woke them up in the middle of the night crying, and though Serik could not seem to be in one place for more than a couple of seconds, neither Yuri or Otabek would have it any other way. 

  
  


It had been a learning process, being parents. Yuri had to learn that anger was not the way to handle a child’s mistakes, and Otabek had to learn how to make his approval, and disapproval, visible, for as Yuri pointed out, most people couldn’t even tell when he was smiling compared to his normal expression. But both Yuri and Otabek got better. They learned together. They learned how to be parents, how to be a part of a family, how to love their children unconditionally. How to help their children and be the parents that their children needed. How to be supportive, and loving, and kind, and patient, and helpful, and all of the other things that make parents great. 

And now, here they were. Five years later. Serik was eight, and Anara was five. Both of them were lovely children. They had their problems of course, as every child does, but over all, Otabek and Yuri felt very lucky. And now, they were about to go ice skating with their children for the very first time. 

Earlier that day, Serik had found a small closet where all of Otabek and Yuri’s medals and trophies were stored away. Neither of them liked to flaunt their awards, so they just kept them hidden away, and this was the first time their kids had ever asked about them. “How come you two have all these medals?” Serik asked. 

“Well you know how Otabek helps coach figure skating and I judge figure skating competitions?” Yuri said. 

“Of course!” Serik said. It was kind of hard for him not to know. Yuri was mostly a stay at home dad, but would occasionally have to go on trips out of the country. Otabek was always at the ice rink during the day, and went to competitions as a coach with his pupils. However, Yuri and Otabek made sure that one of them was always home with the kids, except for the occasional family vacation where they would all go to the competitions, and also stay for a few days afterwards. 

“Well, we both used to compete,” Otabek finished for Yuri. 

“Well, then I want to learn too!” Serik said enthusiastically. 

“You’ve been to countless figure skating competitions before, why the sudden interest in learning how to skate now?” Yuri asked. 

“I didn’t realize before that you two used to be skaters in those competitions as well!” Serik said. 

“What difference does it make that we competed?” Otabek asked, curious.

“It makes it sooo much cooler!!!” explained Serik, as if it were obvious.

“Well, come on, let’s go!” Yuri said, already grabbing his coat.

“What?” Otabek and Serik asked at the same time. 

“Let’s go ice skating! Otabek and I will teach you and your sister, okay?” Yuri said, his eyes glimmering with excitement. 

“Yay!” Serik shouted. 

“Anara, do you want to go ice skating?” Otabek asked his daughter, who was nearby, but not paying attention to the conversation. 

“Sure…” she replied.

“You sound hesitant, are you afraid?” Otabek asked. 

“Yeah,” Anara admitted. 

“Don’t worry, you won’t get hurt!” Yuri reassured. 

“But what if I fall,” Anara said quietly. 

“Then we’ll help you back up. Otabek and I have both fallen more times then you’d ever believe. It doesn’t matter if you fall. It only matters that you get back up afterwards,” Yuri explained, and his daughter, seeming to agree, got her coat and they were soon heading off to the ice rink.

Once they all got their skates on, they started moving in slow circles across the rink, Otabek and Yuri switching between their two children, helping each one with the smooth motion, helping them gain control of themselves on the ice. Though their children fell, they always got back up, and Otabek and Yuri couldn’t have been more proud as their children slowly started to pull away from holding their parents’s hands, and opting to try moving across the ice without anybody else’s help. 

After a while, Yuri moved to the side to watch his kids glide across the ice. He was tired. Though he still went skating relatively frequently, his stamina just wasn’t what it used to be. And as he watched his children meander across the ice, freely, beautifully, he began to reflect on his life. 

He had discovered a couple more ancient greek words for types of love recently. Philio, the love between friends, and tender affection. And storge, the love between family members. His life sure wasn’t what he had expected it to be when he was fifteen. When he was fifteen he had thought that nobody would ever love him. When he was fifteen he was afraid to trust anybody. When he was fifteen he still didn’t know how to handle his thoughts about his mother and his father. When he was fifteen he was confused and lost, and instead of talking through it with someone, or even with himself, he blocked it all off. Until Otabek came along and slowly helped him until he was the person he was today. And today, his life was filled with three things. Agape, philio, and storge. Unconditional love, love between friends, and tender affection, and familial love. As Yuri watched his kids skate around happily and freely, and Otabek help them get back on their feet when they fell, Yuri realized something. He was truly happy. The love that was now surrounding him made him truly happy, and he was so grateful for the beautiful family that he was now so lucky to be a part of. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's done! Once again, this was my first work on a03, so if you have any critiques, don't hesitate to let me know! I hope you enjoyed this story!

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first fanfiction on a03, so any advice and criticism is welcome and appreciated!


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